The beat
by rpg fur
Summary: When new recruits join the zpd, Nick and Judy finally are not the only smaller mammals going on the beat. But a criminal plot is already in the works that if implemented would endanger the citizens of Zootopia and would stretch the police department's resources to their limit.
1. Prologue

**Prologue:**

While the winds were picking up as the rainclouds slowly moved in a young bunny sat on the hill that was close to her families burrows. The scratches on her cheeks still stung from the rubbing alcohol, that her mother had used to clean the wound up that she had gotten from the fight with Gideon. Judy Hopps thought back to the fight feeling still upset with Gideon and wondered if she would end up having to arrest him in the future if he continued to be the abusive animal he was today.

Hearing footsteps approaching where she was sitting she quickly sat up a little straighter and looked over her shoulder. The steps belonged to her father as he climbed the hill. "Hey, Jude how are you feeling?" She could hear the repressed worry in his voice. It would have been a miracle if he hadn't been worried seeing as the moment her mother and he found her the first thing they did (after freaking out over the scratches on her cheek) was marched over to the Greys to give them a piece of their mind.

The elder foxes had been confused by the angry bunnies but soon were as enraged as they were. It was fair to say they had not been pleased to see what their son had done to the Hopps's daughter and they were more than forthcoming to assure Stew that young Gideon would be punished severely for this act.

Somehow Judy didn't feel happy with how things had turned out. Okay, Gideon had received his punishment, but looking back it was fair to say she hadn't done anything to prevent the fight and as such should have been made to carry some of the blame. She tried to smile while she looked up at her father. "Just looking at the stars dad I'll come in in a minute."

Stew smiled back at his daughter and looked up at the stars himself taking note of the incoming clouds and making a mental note to check the fields next day. "I hope that today showed you how dangerous the life of a police officer is. If you become a cop, you just won't be facing small criminals, but also murderers that will want nothing else than to end your life. Then there are the predators that you will have to contend with."

Judy sighed. She loved her father, but his overprotectiveness was stifling at the best of times, and with her cheek hurting she was not really in the mood to be lectured on the dangers of being a police officer. The bunny knew she was very young and even at her age, knew there was more to being a police officer than what she had read about in all the detective novels and information books. There also had been many thoughts about it, and the possibility that she could get hurt had been one thing that had been front and center when choosing her path in life. However, she was Judy Hopps and when she got determined nothing would hold her back.

She looked up at her father again. "I'll think about it dad, but I want to make the world a better place as a police officer."

Her father looked surprised as he gazed back down. Then his features softened while he considered the chance she would see this through. "That's all I'm asking honey. Now let's go home I'm sure it's almost your bedtime."

"Okay dad, I'm right behind you." The bunny stood up and dusted herself off. As she took a last look at the stars she remembered the fight with Gideon and what she said to her friends. Those words were as true now as they were that afternoon and while she walked behind her father she repeated them in her mind. ' _I don't know when to quit_.'

* * *

Nick Wilde opened the suitcase and took a last critical look at the rug he had toiled over for many days to make. He had always known that Mister Big was not a nice mammal, but when he had asked Nick for a fur rug to intimidate certain visitors he had scared the fox half to death. The fox closed his eyes and shivered while his imagination ran away with him. This because the act of skinning a mammal for his fur was brutal by itself and was made only worse seeing as there were very few ways to do. The only two ways he could get hold of a genuine fur rug was to end a mammals life and skin the victim or go to the graveyard and wait for a burial to take place. Then after the burial was finished dig up the body to remove the skin from the corpse.

Both options were horrible, and therefore it was lucky that Nick had found option number three that would give him a rug that was not genuine but would be real enough to please mister Big. The local hospitals always had to shave the fur away from wounds and in crisis, it was still faster to do large patches. The resulting amount of shaven hair got collected in containers divided by species for use in the production of fur suits for mammals that due to illness or medication side effects had lost all of their furs. Some of the containers were extremely large, but luckily for Nick, there had also been several smaller ones, and the fox had been quick to grab one of those to produce a rug from that.

As Nick finished checking the rug, he had to admit he had done an excellent job of making it look authentic, but what worried him was that the document accompanying the container had listed the species and the places where the fur originated from. The fox had not been pleased when he read that most of the hair in his container had been 'harvested' from the backside of a skunk. If he hadn't been so frightened to be caught, he might have bothered to read the documentation beforehand and could have grabbed a better container, but with all the security personnel around the place, it had been amazing that he had managed to grab one at all.

The fox sighed. The rug looked okay and it was better than nothing. Nick was a lot of things but a murderer or graverobber he was not so getting a real fur rug was not happening. Checking himself over in the mirror he brushes away some lint from his shoulder and looking at himself practiced his smile al the while repeating his mantra that had sustained him all his life. ' _Never let them see that they get to you_.'

* * *

It was a calm peaceful evening even though a storm was raging inside two kits sitting on a bench overlooking the meadow in front of their houses. As they looked out over the fields the girl's parents were loading up the family car as several moving mammals took care to load all the families furniture into a van. The young red panda girl and a skunk boy sat next to each other while they both looked like the world was ending. The girl spoke up after several minutes of silence had passed. "Dad says I can make friends again and you could come over to visit from time to time." The last part was done in a hopeful whisper as she desperately tried to hide the sadness of their approaching separation.

The little skunk boy nodded sadly. "Yeah okay." He wanted to say more, but his mind couldn't form the words he needed. She was moving to the other side of the city, and he couldn't even tell her that it would not be the end of their friendship. And deep down he knew she wouldn't be on the other end of the world, but it still seemed like an enormous distance to the five-year-old.

The little girl red panda looked sadly at her friend. "I don't want to go." She leaned over and softly kissed his cheek. The skunk jolted a little, and as he looked up in surprise, he again tried to form the sentence he needed to tell her. Make sure she knew how much she meant to him, but as he opened his mouth to speak her father finished packing their car. He called to the girl to come over so she could say goodbye to the neighbors. Her mother gave the final directions to the moving mammals that had loaded all their stuff minutes before.

The skunk still wanted to say something, but nothing came to mind. Racking his brain for something sweet to say was a line that his favorite hero had said when in the show a similar situation occurred as the hero's friend moved away also. "If you ever are in trouble call for me and I'll come help you."

The red panda smiled at that and gave a small nod. As she was about to reply, her father called again. "Cindy honey it's time to leave. So say goodbye to Joe and come here to say goodbye to the rest of the neighbors." Her eyes opened in horror, and she saw her distress mirrored in the eyes of her friend.

He rallied trying not to break down in front of her and managed to give her a weak smile. Again a quote from a movie came to him that sounded good to him. "We will meet again in the future so we won't be saying goodbye, but till we meet again." And at that last sentence, his front cracked. The red panda saw the tears forming in her friend's eyes and couldn't keep her own in anymore.

With tears streaming, they hugged as her parents looked on. After a couple of minutes, the red panda moved back and stood up giving the skunk a shaky smile and wave as she walked away.

The skunk looked as the red panda family said goodbye to his own and entered their car. The girl looked back at him and gave a final wave as the car started and drove away. Suddenly his whole body shook, and he dashed. He ran as fast as his legs could carry him. His destination a hill that was a small distance away. If he could make it there before the car passed, he could see her one last time.

It would not change the outcome, and she would still be gone, but at that moment he would do everything to delay, even for a second, the inevitable parting that was happening.

As he reached the top and saw the taillights of the car slowly disappearing in the distance he became aware that he hadn't made it in time. The skunk had given everything he had, but it was clear that it hadn't been enough and with that realization, another followed directly behind that everything was now over. The love he had felt for her was one of the things that he had been afraid to confess to her and now he would never be able to. As the storm raged on inside of him he fell to his knees and cried.

* * *

The red panda girl was crying as her father consoled her. She had been lied to!

The girl and her father had taken a shortcut through the alley next to the pizza place to make sure the pizzas were still warm when they got home, but had been threatened at knifepoint by a robber demanding her father's wallet. Her dad had put himself between her and the robber making sure she was covered before reaching back and giving the robber what he asked for.

For a moment the robber looked pleased, and the young panda took notice that he was a skunk. It indeed was strange to see a skunk do something like this as the only skunks she had known where her best friend and his parents who were all honest mammals. As she pondered what had caused this skunk to resort to stealing it looked like the robber would go away, but just as the robber was about to leave he lunged and stabbed her father in the leg.

The anger and fear she felt had been like nothing she had felt before. It wasn't fair! Her father had given him his wallet! She grabbed for her father al the while screaming. It was then she remembered the promise and called for him with all her might. Quickly looking around to see from which direction he would be coming she looked down the alley the robber disappeared in. Sadly the young skunk she expected never appeared the girl felt the bitter feelings of betrail. Alerted by the scream of the young girl a couple of wolves came running into the alleyway and, seeing the predicament the father was in, rushing to their aid.

As the male wolf reached her father, he grabbed his thigh and put pressure on the wound as the red panda's pants darkened with blood. It was clear that he was in a lot of pain and as the mate of the wolf, that was putting pressure on the leg called the police, the young red panda broke down. Any other time she would have known what to say or what to do, but torn by the betrayal, and the real fear gripping her over the possibility of losing her father, she just froze up and started crying her eyes out.

The dad looking up saw his daughter breaking down shaking in fear, and while the wolf kept the pressure on his leg, the skunk managed to crawl over a bit to grab her in his arm as he softly soothed her. Another couple that had taken the same shortcut through the alley found the four mammals and jumped in to help. As the night fell on another day, the child cried in her father's arms as he tried his best to console her al the while with the sound of sirens filling the night sky.

* * *

In an underground bunker, several mammals were observing a kindergarten class filled with orphans.

"Do you think this will work?"

"According to the first findings not only will it work, but if done correctly will lead to mammals that will follow an order to the letter."

"If the world finds out about this they will have our heads."

"Then let's make sure the world doesn't find out about it."

* * *

The city of Zootopia received a shock when they found out that not only had predators started to go wild, but the mayor at the time (a predator himself) had actively been kidnapping the ones gone savage to hide this. After the press conference, the officer who had brought this all to light gave the city a reason to start tearing itself apart, and it was only through the laws put in place by mayor Bellwether that it wasn't allowed to go any further.

A couple of months went by where the city, while not tearing itself apart, was not the happy place that anyone wanted to live in. Just as it seemed that the laws that had been put in place to keep mammals from fighting each other were about to fail. The same police officer came back and with the help of the mammal that had helped her before, exposing the previous mayor, blew open a conspiracy that the current mayor had constructed to remove the predator population from the city.

Again the city reeled from the shock, and it was only through the combined efforts of the hastily elected major Swinton, the ZPD, local community leaders as well as stars and celebrities like Gazelle that emotions kept in check and the situation didn't evolve into total anarchy.

Major Swinton started a campaign of total disclosure. Several boards of inquiry were started up to go over everything former mayor's Lionheart and Bellwether had done during their time in the office. Everything they ever brought forth, approved or signed into law got studied with a level of scrutiny that would make the Spanish Inquisition seem like relaxed stoners. Any law or rule that looked even the bit suspicious got temporarily repealed until it was clear if the proposal was approved in good faith or with nefarious intent.

The ZPD in the meanwhile enforced the martial law that Swinton had placed over the city till things calmed down. Any signs of trouble starting were enough to see the ZPD respond with as much force as they could muster and it was such a show of force that they only needed to do it three times to get the message across. The ZPD also made sure to keep a specific bunny officer and her fox assistant out of the public eye for their protection.

The local community leaders met up with Swinton several times a day and through them, the mayor could keep a tap on how things were progressing in the city and what was needed to alleviate the concerns of her citizens.

Last but not least were the outreach from stars and celebrities. They held events to bring predator and prey populations together again and by showing the mammals what the shared instead of how they differed slowly started to heal the rift that had formed between them.

As our story begins the before mentioned bunny and fox have been partners for a year. The city is again peaceful. However, some scars remain. And several mammals have just graduated from the Zootopia police academy. Under them, several smaller officers that got a chance through the mammal's inclusion initiative (and show what a little mammal can do) wanted to make the world a better place themselves. Sadly this new batch will be tested as darkness starts falling over Zootopia once again.


	2. Chapter 1 - New faces

**Chapter 1: New Faces**

The morning sun was warm and the day was promising to turn out great. Cindy, a young red panda fresh from the academy, did the last check of her fur and freshly pressed police uniform as she slowly climbed the steps towards her new place of employment at the zpd. The many long months of hard work and study finally paid off. As she had received her badge from the director he gave her her assignment and now she could rank herself among the top that graduated from the academy. This as the post to work at precinct one was an honor only offered to the top graduates that had not just climbed to the top of their class but who had also excelled in grades and evaluation. Reaching the front door, Cindy took a deep breath and opened it.

As she entered the lobby she was surprised with the level of activity, mammals milling around going about their business, officers going around doing the things that needed to be done and the occasional officer escorting a mammal under arrest to the cells. Noticing the greeting desk in the middle of the lobby she quickly hurried over to it all the while being mindful not to get in anyone's way (especially the larger mammals). Seeing as this was her first day she hoped that the mammal manning the station could give her directions towards the bullpen. The overweight cheetah who was currently stationed there happily munched away on his donuts and was preoccupied with a movie playing on his phone. It took Cindy a couple of tries to get him to notice her, but when he did, he turned to her while giving the warmest smile she had ever received from anyone.

"Ooh if it isn't one of our newest members on the force!" The cheetah leaned over to take a good look at her. Cindy smiled at him but felt a little self-conscious as he seemed to be sizing her up. "Benjamin Clawhauser at your service." Standing straight Ben made a little-exaggerated bow.

Cindy smiled back at the cheetah. Even though he made her a little uncomfortable, it was clear the portly cheetah hadn't meant any harm by his actions. "Cindy Soniko pleased to meet you. I need to get to morning briefing could you show me where to go?" At this, the red panda looked around nervously looking for any signs she might have missed before asking. Nothing would be more humiliating as asking for directions when things were clearly marked.

Clawhauser nodded his understanding and realized that he should not detain her longer than was necessary on her first day. "Ah! Right sorry. Just head to your right, the bullpen is over there." Ben said while pointing her towards an unmarked door to the side of the hall.

Cindy gave Ben a friendly nod as she thanked him and walked toward the door, the cheetah specified, expecting to find the bullpen behind it. While crossing the lobby, she looked around taking in the sights and getting a feel for the layout. The open structure of the hall with all floors above looking down made for an impressive display.

As she wondered about which floor her assigned desk would be on, she reached and opened the door entering the briefing room. The first thing that struck her as odd was that the chairs were all designed for larger mammals. While it didn't bother her, she found it strange that seeing that thanks to the mammal inclusion act more smaller mammals applied and graduated from the police academy, there hadn't been changes made to the furniture to accommodate them. Finding one empty chair halfway down the room, she climbed on and greeted the elephant sitting next to her.

Giving a small wave, she attracted the female. "Hi! Officer Soniko! Happy to be working with you." The panda tried to keep the nerves out of her voice but hoped she had sounded more assured of herself than she felt at that moment.

The elephant looked down and gave her a warm smile. "Pennington, but you can call me Francine." Soniko noticed the kindness in the way the officer talked to her and felt happy that her colleague seemed at least to be accepting of her.

"Ok, you can call me Cindy." The panda quickly gave her paw in greeting and shook the larger one of the elephant. As the two females finished with the shake, there seemed to be some commotion coming from the outside as two mammals appeared to be having a rather loud discussion.

Just as the red Panda wondered who could be making that racket the door of the bullpen opened again, and the two mammals that Cindy admired (just like every other small prey or predator with ambitions to becoming police officers) walked in. Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde seemed to be having a rather one-sided discussion about proper conduct with the bunny giving the fox rather powerful reminders about uniform regulations as the fox just smiled and tussled the bunny's ears. The doe hit his arm rather hard making Nick squirm a bit, but Cindy saw the small smile on the bunny's face and was sure the hit had been a well-meant response to the friendly gesture of ribbing.

The red panda couldn't help but be annoyed at her feelings of being awestruck. She had never been a fangirl, but she couldn't deny the giddiness she was experiencing being in the same room as these two.

As they passed her chair, Judy noticed the new small officer in the room and came over. "Hey, a new face. Hi, Judy Hopps." At this, she offered her paw to shake. "It's nice to see the mammal inclusion act is bringing in smaller recruits."

"Cindy Soniko pleasure to meet you." The bunny and red panda shook while exchanging greetings as Nick Wilde came up as well for the standard introductions and handshaking. Before they could get to know each other any better the hippo standing at the front of the room suddenly called out "Atten-hut." Then he quickly got in his seat as Judy and Nick promptly ran to the front to get in theirs. The door at the side of the room opened, and the bullpen roared with the sound of officers pounding their desk while the cape buffalo Cindy recognized as the chief of the zpd walked in.

"Ok, ok shut it!" The chief looked around with a look of annoyance, but somehow Cindy couldn't shake the feeling there was a smile hidden behind that gruff facade.

As everyone settled down again, the chief picked up his clipboard. "Good morning. We've got four items on the docket. First off we've got a couple of new recruits today." At this, the chief looked up and scanned the room.

Cindy felt her heart swell with pride as she wondered who the mammal was who had graduated with such high marks as her as she didn't recognize anyone that had come from the academy. Not only that but during the graduation, no one else had received a posting at precinct one. Suddenly a dark feeling took hold of her as she remembered the other mammal that could have had a shot to accept such an assignment see as he too had high scores before he got kicked out of the academy.

As the dark memories came back to her, she remembered the moment he had looked at her for help his ruby red eyes staring into her sapphire ones, but Cindy could only walk away as the evidence clearly showed what kind of mammal he had become. She quickly cleared her head of those thoughts seeing as they were distracting her from the rest of the briefing.

The buffalo looked around noticing the red panda but failed to find his other recruit. Feeling a bit miffed and making sure to take note of his missing officer he continued on. "I should introduce them, but frankly, I don't care." The chief kept going on as he flipped the paper and looked back on the clipboard.

The officers snorted at that, and the red panda saw that most cast an amused glance her way before turning their attention back to the chief. Francine leaned over at seeing Cindy's confusion. "Don't let it bother you he does that with every new rookie that comes in." She said as she too chuckled. The red panda realized the joke and shrugged it off smiling at the sniggering at her expense.

The chief looked around again and continued on. "Second point. As of yesterday at sixteen hundred hours the Nighthowler containment act has been passed by the ruling body of Zootopia. Meaning that only agricultural users like farmers with the correct permits are authorized to buy, move or use them. Possession of the bulbs and flowers without these permits is now an arrestable offense, so when you spot someone in possession of them, you bring them and the bulbs in."

It had been common knowledge that the law was coming. Since the 'savage mammal' case, the sale and use of Nighthowlers had been forbidden entirely, but the farming community had called out for a loosening of this law like no other means of pesticide was as effective or non-toxic as the blue flowers. The outcry had caused the ruling body to reexamine the law, and the sale of Nighthowlers had become sort of a gray area during this grace period. However being found with the bulbs without good enough reason where you needed them for would still be grounds for getting a warning or a hefty fine (also the bulbs would always be confiscated).

"Ok third is..." As the chief was about to continue sounds of something hitting the door sounded through the room before the door burst open and a hare came running in. Bogo was not in a good mood and having the meeting disrupted in such a way only served to further deepen his anger towards the mammal responsible.

"Sorry, I'm late!" The hare gasped while bending over apparently out of breath. It was clear to see that the small officer was sweating profusely and probably had run all the way there. Even though the other officers felt sympathy for their diminutive colleague no one dared to utter a word as they all also know how the chief would respond to this interruption.

The chief lowered his clipboard and schooled his features giving him a look of pure annoyance instead of one of pure rage. "Ah, officer Umbra how sweet of you to join us and only ten minutes late on your first day!"

The Hare noticed the tone of the chief's speech and, hearing that somewhere a powder keg was burning and it wouldn't be a good idea to let it blow, quickly moved to explain his tardiness. "Yeah I'm sorry sir, but I was..."

At this, the chief cut him off with a wave of his hoof. "Don't care. I've got your assignment for the day." Even though there could have been a perfectly good reason for the officer to be late the chief would not entertain the notion of hearing it. There had to be disciplined, and the crime of tardiness held only one response in the chief's mind.

The hare's ears dropped as apprehension was clearly visible on his face. "Yes, sir?"

"Parking duty and you are to report to my desk after your shift... Dismissed." With this, the buffalo raised his papers again and gave the hare a very stern look.

The rabbit realizing that further disciplinary actions had been put on hold till after his shift quickly turned around and left the bullpen rather than to risk the additional ire of the chief. Cindy had to rub her temples as she finally understood who the second graduate from the academy was. Harris Umbra was not a bad guy, but he just always seemed to say or do the things that annoyed her the most.

Pendelton saw the panda's actions. "You know him?" Francine whispered as she leaned over. The elephant enjoyed the occasional gossip and was eager to learn more about the officer that had just been ejected from the meeting.

"Yeah, apparently he also was at the top of the class to graduate. Didn't think Harris would be posted here as his physical scores shouldn't have been enough to elicit a posting at precinct one though." Cindy said as she tried to rub a headache away that seeing Umbra and remembering the other one had given her.

"Well pray for him he isn't late again. The chief won't give him parking duty a second time if you catch my meaning." The elephant said giving the panda an understanding look.

Cindy gave a halfhearted shrug. "Don't worry as annoying as he is I don't think he would be stupid enough to let this happen again." The red panda faced forwards just as the chief regained his composure again.

"Ok, shut it!" The chief hit his stand a little harder than normal, and everyone quieted down again. "Ok before I was interrupted..."

* * *

 **EARLIER THAT DAY**

The sun was already shining warmly as Harris Umbra a brown hare was running towards precinct one. The power outage that had occurred last night on his city block had turned his alarm off, and after whimpering, while rushing to get showered and presentable, he was desperately trying to make up for the time he had woken up late.

' _Great job Harris sleeping in on your first day. Keep that up, and you'll be demoted to assistant filing clerk before the end of the year_.' As he kept berating himself, he noticed in passing an elderly lioness waiting to cross the street, but looking back it soon became apparent that the traffic was too thick for her to safely cross. Cursing at his inability to ignore mammals that needed help and the unfairness of the universe in general Harris turned around and quickly approached the lioness.

Looking up at the old granny Harris gave a small salute and spoke in a friendly voice to get her attention. "Good morning ma'am. Officer Umbra at your service can I assist you with crossing the street?"

The lioness looked down and noticed the police mammal grabbed her glasses to have a closer look at the hare. She took extra time to examine the badge on the hare's chest before her face brightened with a cheery smile. "Yes, officer I could use the help. It pleases me that a kind bunny like you takes time out of his day to help an old biddy like me."

Harris did his best to hide his revulsion at his species being mislabeled. "Hare ma'am, and it's no problem I'm happy to help." At this, he gave her a friendly smile and took one of her arms while raising his other to stop the traffic. "Please allow me." As he kept a soft but firm grip on the grannies arm, he started guiding her to the other side of the road.

She gave a slight giggle at her mistake and let Harris lead her. "Oh pardon me. Now you mention it the difference is clearly visible of course, how silly of me."

The hare couldn't get mad at her. It wasn't like she had done it purposely and there were even younger mammals who had trouble telling the species apart. "No problem ma'am you wouldn't be the only one who makes that mistake." The police officer couldn't get really offended by it, but still found it important that the difference between the two species was acknowledged."

As Harris let the traffic move on, he gently made sure the lioness got onto the sidewalk okay. As she watched the hare step onto the street himself, she started talking again. "What an exciting world we live in today. Just a hundred of thousands of years ago predators would eat prey and now we can't even cross the street by ourselves anymore! Not without the help of kind-hearted bunnies like yourself."

The hare gave a slight nod trying to mask the shiver at the unintentional faux pas the lioness just said. "It is no problem at all, and it's hare ma'am."

Again the lioness gave a warm laugh and Harris wasn't sure if he didn't see a playful twinkle in her eyes as she regarded him. "Oh yes, I keep forgetting silly me."

Seeing as the granny was fine now Harris was about to say goodbye and walk away when she stopped him by grabbing his shoulder. "Oh, you sweet, adorable mammal please let me reward you."

Harries tried to remove her paw from his shoulder as he had a sinking feeling about the time he must have lost "No need ma'am it's just part of doing my job. Also, the department doesn't allow us to receive rewards for the work that we do as part of our job."

The lioness looked at him as the smile on her face widened. "And so polite, but this is no time for modesty. A nice young man like yourself deserves a reward." She pulled out her wallet and retrieved a penny from it. "This is for your trouble sonny. Now don't go spending this all at once you hear." At this, she took the hare's cheek and gave it a pinch while smiling warmly at him.

Umbra was not a betting mammal, but for once he was damn sure that she was playing a game with him. The playful glint in her eyes was now in full effect, and she was cautious so that there was nothing in her demeanor he could call her out on.

She seemed to remember something suddenly and looked him over once before searching her handbag. "Ah, do you want to see a picture of my granddaughter? She's about your age and a lovely girl. Just shy you know never seems to make a connection with eligible males. I'm pretty sure she's been looking for a man just like yourself."

' _One-tenth her height and movable in her handbag?_ ' Harris thought. "Sorry ma'am, but I've got to run I'm late for morning br..."

The old biddy gave a startled gasp as she slapped her paw to her muzzle. "Oh you dear where are my manners! Making you late while I keep rambling on and on and on. Just last Saturday Judith said. Wait was it, Judith? I'm sure it was Judith." The lioness kept on rambling while she returned to looking in her handbag for the picture.

Seeing the opportunity present itself as the lioness focused all her attention at her handbag Harris quickly excused himself and ran off as the lioness kept talking to the spot where he had been standing.

Harris fearfully looked at his watch and with terror gripping his heart put extra strength in his legs to run even faster. When he reached the precinct, he almost slammed the door and kept on running to the greeting desk.

As the hare took a couple of deep gasps to be able to speak, he saw the shocked and worried face of the cheetah stationed there. "Late... Briefing... Where?" Harris managed to get out between the huge gasps for air.

As Clawhauser got over his earlier startlement, he pointed over towards the bullpen. "It's over there," Ben spoke with kind words laced with worry still showing on his face.

"Kay... Thank you... Bye." With that Harris was stumbling, while holding his side, towards the door, the cheetah had indicated.

Ben kept looking till he entered the door and thought for a moment. He had been on duty there for many years and was almost sure how the chief would react. Smiling to himself, Ben laid out the key's to the meter maid cart along with the vest and was just finishing at the moment the hare return to the lobby. It had gone over as well as the cheetah feared as the defeated remains of what was once a mammal sauntered over to his desk.

Ben felt sorry for the Buck, but could only give positive encouragement as he handed over the keys and vest and watched him leave. "First day on the job and late. Poor hare. Chief is probably going to eat him alive when he returns today."

* * *

The briefing had neared its conclusion, and Judy and Nick sat at attention as the last of the assignments were being handed out.

"Officers Hopps, Wilde, Soniko. You are to patrol Savanna Central. Hopps, Wilde I'm keeping the new rookies with you two for now. Show them the ropes and keep them out of trouble and out of my hair." The chief looked at his three smallest officers and seeing that the fox was about to say something snarky gave Nick a look that was just screaming 'try me.'

At this, Nick cringed a bit before he and Judy stood at attention and gave a perfect salute. "Yes, sir!"

Bogo nodded once and left the bullpen. Cindy looked confused as Judy snorted and shoved her partner playfully. "Well nice to see you can be serious if the chief is about to clobber you slick!"

Looking at his partner, the fox gave a unamused huff. "Yeah, my dear Carrots I was not about to risk further raising the ire of our esteemed leader after one of our rookies decides to be fashionably late," Nick said as he slid off their shared chair and started walking towards the lobby.

Judy frowned at what the fox said and asked confused. "What do you mean our rookies?"

Nick chuckled and pointed towards Soniko "You missed the part about keeping them with us for the foreseeable future?"

Judy's ears went limb as the assignment they had received before she had become distracted by the little display with Nick and the Chief. The bunny realized finally that for at least the next few weeks they were indeed stuck with showing the new blood the ropes. "Damn and we haven't had a real case in weeks. So now it even seems that if something does pop up, we are going to be in support roles at best."

Nick noticed that the red panda seemed worried. The way the conversation was going could indeed be misconstrued to mean they weren't happy to be partnered with her. "Afraid so fluff, but on the bright side we get to mess with our new recruits, so it's not all bad!" Nick said as he gave Soniko a friendly smile to reassure her that she wasn't a burden.

After that Nick ruffled Judy's ears earning him a 'hey' with a quick punch to his side. After straightening up again, he turned back towards Cindy and motioned her to follow them. "Ok! Red follow us."

"Red?" Soniko looked at Judy with confusion clearly written on her face.

Judy just sighed. She had gotten used to the nicknames, but for most mammals who only met him, it was still confusing. "He gives everyone he likes a nickname. Don't worry you'll get used to yours over time. Also fair warning his kind of humor is something you'll have to get used to over time also."

"Oh come on Carrots don't pretend that you don't love my nicknames or my sense of humor," Nick said in mock hurt.

Judy couldn't help but privately agree to that statement as she found his humor actually funny most of the time and the nicknames he had for her endearing. She had to wonder though when they stopped feeling like insults and morphed into the kind that gave her warm feelings whenever he used them. "You wish slick. Now come on we need to get going, or the chief will hang all our tails out to dry."

* * *

The patrol in the cruiser had gone over mostly uneventful as the morning passed. They had been directed to a disturbance early in the morning to what seemed was an elderly lioness beating another lion with her walking cane for 'being a savage and scaring away a nice bunny.'

The poor biddy was under the illusion that the lion had come along and scared off the bunny she had been talking to earlier, but the lion that gotten beaten claimed there was no bunny to be seen and she had been talking on and on to empty air while searching for something in her purse. It was after the lion asked if she was alright that she looked around searching for something before freaking out on him.

A quick call to dispatch had seen the lioness being picked up by her relatives. They assured the officers that she was mostly sane, but sometimes she could have a moment of not being all there.

Afterward, things had stayed quiet, and soon it was nearing lunchtime. As Nick was about to suggest the three of them head over to his and Judy's favorite lunch stop, the radio came alive. "Ten-Nora-fifteen please respond."

Nick groaned in displeasure before grabbing the radio. "This is ten-Nora-fifteen over."

Clawhausers voice came over the airwaves again. "Please be advised there have been several calls made about mammals having their wallets stolen. Reported description of a possible suspect matches a Duke Weaselton on file." The last part of the message was clearly said with a hint of joking.

Judy and Nick groaned, and Cindy was looking at them both, not understanding. For now, she would hold off on asking questions till the radio call was finished.

"Well bring him in for questioning over," Nick called in. He was irritated as he had been looking forward to lunch and now thanks to Duke it would be postponed a bit.

As Nick returned the radio, he looked over to Judy and saw the same annoyance on her face. "We'll have to have a late lunch it seems." The fox could hear the ire in her voice and hoped that Duke would be smart if they caught up with him and not give them trouble. His bunny was not someone to mess with when she was hungry.

Seeing as the radio call had finished the red panda spoke up. "This Duke Weaselton, you guys know him?" Cindy asked while wondering about the total annoyance her partners displayed at hearing the guys name.

Judy gave a humorless laugh. "Yeah, you can say that. When you have been on the job for a month, you will probably have seen enough of Duke to last you a lifetime." The bunny could remember her first arrest and the second. Then her third. Every time she picked Duke up, she brought him into the precinct with less and less enthusiasm. She was sure that is she would search the definition of 'repeat criminal' there would just be a photo of his mugshot on there.

"But you said we'd bring him in. We wouldn't know for sure if he did anything wrong at this moment." The red panda quickly pointed out fearing that her partners were in danger of overlooking facts for a quick arrest.

Nick just chuckled. "Believe me Red as soon as you hear he is involved it's safe to assume that he's guilty of something. So even if we find out that he isn't responsible for pickpocketing, you can be sure as moisture in the Rainforest district that we'll have to arrest him for something else, as he's in all likelihood already doing something that breaks the law on multiple counts.

Cindy sat back and closed her eyes. She had been hungry too, and the idea that she had to wait longer till she could get some food didn't do anything to raise her spirit. But even though the morning had been dull it couldn't be denied that it had been significantly improved by the two officers in front of her as conversing with them had been a blast. Their constant banter back and forth had her chuckling more than once, and she found herself looking forward to the afternoon even though the fact that lunch was on hold for now still sucked.

* * *

Harris had had a rough morning. The joke mobile that was his ride for the day had been the slowest thing imaginable. The meters had been going off consistently (which meant that at least he could write a decent amount of tickets, but it also entailed a constant amount of abuse). And lastly, the universe seemed to have a slow day and needed a laugh at the expense of the poor hare as one of his tires of his vehicle went flat.

Cursing his fate, Harris looked up to the heavens and asked. "What have I done to deserve this?"

"Bad day?" The familiar voice behind him sounded warm with a hint of comradery.

Harris knew that voice and had to smile. With how bad his day had been going it was good that at the very least he would get to see a friendly face now and maybe get some pleasant conversation. "Hey, Joe how's life treating you?"

Turning around Harris regarded the Skunk standing there. Joe was smiling, but the hare could see the smile didn't reach his eyes. He could easily guess what his problem was, but it was sadly in the past and out of his hands.

"Not great. Getting kicked out of the academy for drug use while it wasn't my drugs they found still sucks. But at least I won't give up on proving my innocence." Joe said as he sighed.

Harris gave a friendly smile to his old classmate. The way that had gone down was still something that ired the hare, and he made a mental note to investigate when he had some seniority under his belt. "That's the spirit! If you need anything at all just ask me. Don't know if I can provide it of course, but at the very least I'll try."

The skunk straightened up a bit, and the smile was a lot more genuine. "Thanks, that means a lot. You need help with your wheel?" Joe asked still smiling at his old classmate as he looked at the three-wheeled excuse for transportation.

"Nah don't worry about it. I'm in hot water for being late. If the chief should learn, I asked a civilian to help with repairs to my vehicle I'll likely be demoted to speed bump." The hare's ears dropped again as he looked at his flat and the lost time it represented.

Joe shrugged. "Ok if that is what you want I'll let you to it." With those final words, Joe waved goodbye and headed down the street.

Harris looked at his vehicle one more time and grumbling removed the jack and spare tire to exchange the flat.


	3. Chapter 2 - Training plans

**Chapter 2: Training plans.**

Nick, Judy, and Soniko were patrolling the district keeping an eye out for Weaselton. The hours had slipped away, but their quarry had been quite elusive, and there hadn't been any more pickpocketings to give them a clue in which direction to look for him. Nick was beginning to worry that Weaselton had already filled his quota for the day and had gone home making it quite hard to do anything about it. The reports of pickpocketing had just commented that someone looking like him was near when the theft took place, but no one had caught the mammal in the act.

The radio came alive with traffic. "All patrols in the vicinity of Lowland drive please be on the lookout for a weasel in a white tank top and running shorts. He was trying to steal from a rhino before the caller stopped him but he couldn't prevent him from escaping. The suspect was last seen heading towards that general area."

Judy looked at Nick and saw the confirmation in his eyes. The description of the clothes had fitted Weaselton correctly. "Well, it seems our quarry has moved his hunting grounds. Think he will still be there?"

Nick thought for a moment then nodded. "Lowland drive isn't far, let's head up that way, maybe we'll get lucky."

Suddenly they heard a deep rumbling sound coming from the back seat followed by a squeak of embarrassment. As both cops tried to suppress their laughter, an embarrassed Cindy sulkily muttered. "Yeah yeah laugh it up. So what I'm hungry. Hopefully, we'll get him soon."

Judy glanced at her noticing that the red panda apparently was low on energy. Turning around to check the time they had been at it for hours now and they needed a break to rest and eat soon. She quickly decided that they were due for one now and asked Nick. "Isn't that cafe with those great salads you took me a couple of weeks ago not around those parts?"

Remembering the place Judy mentioned he quickly thought if it was close enough for them to swing by. "Yeah, just two blocks down where Duke disappeared. Seeing as we're heading that way anyway, we can get our lunch takeaway style. I'll call ahead and order for us. Don't worry by the way this will be my treat as a welcome for our newest co-worker." Nick gave the girls a wink and informed dispatch that they were heading towards the rainforest district.

* * *

As they arrived at the cafe, the program regulating the weather of the rainforest area had gone too heavy showers mode and the weather, as a result, had taken a turn for the worst. As the rain was pouring down Nick looked out of his window before looking over to his companions. "Seeing as I'm footing the bill for our lunch, would one of you two lovely ladies be so kind as to pick up our order?"

Judy looked at the pouring rain and frowned. "Not a change Slick! Aren't you a gentlemammle?"

"The gentlemammle hates to get wet." Looking over his shoulder, Nick asked. "How about you Red? If you want to impress your superiors, this is the way to do it."

Cindy gave him a half-lidded stare and scuffed. "I'll admit that I'm probably still green, but not so green that I would fall for something like that." Looking out of the vehicle she could clearly see that it wasn't just raining it was pouring.

Nick chuckled and decided that if he wanted to prevent getting his fur wet he'd have to think of something else fast. "Ok rock paper scissors then! Loser has to get the food."

Judy and Cindy exchanged looks and shrugged. They could at least play along with the fox who was footing the bill. "Fine, we'll do it your way."

They had to go three times before Cindy did rock to Judy's and Nick's papers and grumbling got out of the car into the downpour. As she loudly swore and cursed as she ran towards the salad bar two grinning faces looked at her go.

"How long do you think it will take her to figure out how we hustled her?" Judy looked at Nick with a smirk, feeling slightly guilty over the prank they had pulled on their coworker.

Nick gave a small laugh as he gave Judy a wink. "Not long Carrots she is cleverer than most and probably is already realizing that we could signal each other as she couldn't see our other hands because of the bench."

The two friends had hustled many coworkers this way. The hand they were using for the rock paper scissors was clearly visible, but the one they held in their laps was used to show the other which they were going to use. Somehow their victims never clued in that the two where in cahoots until it was too late and they already did the thing they had rock-paper-scissored to get out of.

Judy stretched a little to relieve the strain in her legs of driving the whole day. "What a day. Still, it's good to know that Nighthowlers are regulated now. A lot of farms back home were really dependent on them." She sat back against the seat rubbing her shoulders to get the stiffness out.

Nick nodded at this remembering Bunnyburrow, and it's nice calming atmosphere. "Yeah. Is your dad going to use Nighthowlers again as he was complaining about the problems with vermin the last time we were there." The fox had been coming along with Judy to the farm and while everyone was happy to see them the last few visits had been a little strained. Father Hopps had been moody and drawn back, but had been quick to assure the both of them that it had been over the problems with pests on his produce.

The bunny shook her head. "No, he already found an answer to his pest problem and he's using carnivorous plants and parasite wasps. By combining them, he found he gets almost the same results without the hassle to make Nighthowlers safe to use on the farm."

"Hassle like what?" He had to ask as, thinking back, the only danger the flowers posted on the farm was to the little buns of the Hopps clan who might not know to stay away from the flowers and that was something they could prevent with warnings (and spankings if they didn't listen).

"He's afraid that because my involvement with stopping the threat the Nighthowlers posed to Zootopia, our farm is more likely to be robbed of bulbs and flowers. If they did that dad fears, it would be damaging to me as he believes the news report on it would ruin my career." Judy smiled a little sad smile. "He's always been so protective of us even at the cost of himself. "

Nick softly petted Judy's head making sure to stroke her ears a little. Judy closed her eyes and gave a soft hum as the sadness she was feeling started to lift. As she looked at him, she saw the warm smile he gave her and felt the butterflies that were always present in the background whenever she was near him.

"Anyway the hassles that he would have to endure would be making sure that the fields were guarded twenty-four seven to keep criminals from stealing the flowers. Having to deal with all the administration that comes with the buying, use, and destruction of the Nighthowlers. And if that is not enough mom and dad would have to be always worried for the safety of their children from both the flowers and possible assailants."

At this Nick couldn't deny that Judy's dad had a point with no longer wanting to use the blue flowers. "With everything you mentioned it's a good thing he found those other methods." The farm had not yet been in trouble during their last visit, but it had been clear that the Hopps patriarch had been somewhat on edge about the danger to his crops.

"Yeah it's a load of the mind of my parents, and I'm happier with this solution too." Smiling at her partner, Judy suddenly remembered the phone call she had with her parents a couple of nights ago. "Speaking of the farm mom asked me when we would come over again. She mentioned that it's been a couple of months since the last time we visited. They also wanted the time to get to know you a little better now that we're living together. "

The fox looked at his partner and quickly checking outside if their rookie was coming back before stealing a kiss. "I'm amazed that your parents were ok with you living together with a fox." It had been nervewracking when Judy revealed during a muzzle time conversation that she and Nick were in a relationship and that they had moved in together. Her parents had been shocked and quite miffed about finding out during a phone call. They had calmed down a bit over the next couple of weeks and made sure to tell their daughter that they would support her decision as long as it made her happy.

Judy smiled at him and gave him a quick peck on the nose before hugging his side. "Why? You've met Gideon, and my parents have been working with him for months now."

Nick hugged her back and softly kissed the top of her head. "Yeah working with a fox and having your daughter sleeping with a fox are two entirely different things Carrots."

Judy shrugged. "What can I say, maybe it's been the fact that you stayed with me during that fight when we exposed Bellwether. They feel they can trust you with my safety or something like that. And don't forget the kits love you."

Nick smiled as he thought back to the visits to the farm. The first time the tiny buns had kept their distance and the elders had been quite ill at ease, but slowly during his stay, the family had warmed up to him. He had expected that this would be the norm for a couple of visits before they knew him well enough, but to his surprise, the family had apparently felt sufficiently at ease with him that the elders had welcomed him back with open arms and the little ones had buried him in fluffy hell. "Well I don't see why we couldn't go for a visit soon, but when do you think would it be best for us to go?"

The doe had to think for a moment about that. The partners each had enough time saved up that they could afford to go for a week. As Judy thought which week to take though, she remembered a festival that was coming up. "In a month the carrot harvesting festival is happening again. We could go for a week, that way my parents and the little ones get to spend enough time with you and me, and as a bonus, it would be good fun to explore the fair and rides."

Nick leaned back mulling it over. Going for a week to Bunnyburrow would be fun, but he had been told by Judy that last time the festival was held that the local police force had been stretched to their limit as there were barely enough officers to keep a check on everything. Their apparent personnel problem gave him an idea, and he grinned at the possibility of getting that family time without costing them their vacation hours. "What do you think about asking the chief to send the rookies and us to bolster the Bunnyburrow police department during the event. It would be good training for them, and we have an easier time convincing him for that than to give us the week off. Sadly we would have to work during the day, but we still have the mornings and evenings to spend with your family. Hell, we could drive straight there coming from our Friday shift and spend the weekends there as well."

Judy had to agree with his plan as she realized that the rookies would have to be assigned to another cop pair before the festival came. If they were not reassigned new mentors by then, it would be a no-go for Bogo. Also seeing the size of their trainees she could easily convince her parents to let the two new members on the force stay over with them. As a added bonus it would take some of the attention from the family of their budding relationship. "Could be fun seeing the kerfluffle have two new victims and seeing as there would be two new mammals for the little ones to play with we would end up having more time for each other." She gave her boyfriend a quick kiss before looking at his bemused expression.

As the fox tried to stifle his laughter, he pointed to the diner, and as Judy turned to look, she had to stifle a giggle too. They both watched as Cindy came running back through the downpour with a takeaway bag stiffly held to her chest, all the while looking like a drowned rat. It was evident by the way her mouth was moving that she was still cursing aloud and Nick pulled a towel he always kept from under his seat to be prepared with a peace offering. This as he saw the angry glare the very wet panda was showing in their direction. Still cursing as she opened the door and quickly getting in, she shot them another glare before exclaiming. "I hate you both! Don't think you can ever pull that stunt again as I will bury you alive!"

"Why Red I didn't know you felt so negatively about us," Nick said in mock hurt while a smile stayed on his face.

"You understand me you cheated!" Cindy huffed indignantly. "I would never have thought that two mammals credited with the removal of the corruption in city hall would stoop so low."

"It's called a hustle sweetheart. " Judy chuckled before turning around to give Cindy an apologetic smile. "Didn't mean any harm though. It's just Nick's and my way to tease you." The bunny did feel a little sorry for sending Cindy through the water cascade that was currently being poured down on them.

The fox had the decency to look apologetic too. "Yeah sorry Red, just messing with the new blood, here hope this helps with lifting your murderous attitude, " Nick said apologetically with a smirk in place as he handed Cindy the towel.

As the red panda dried herself off to the best of her ability, she directed the glare at Nick one last time before huffing and opening the takeaway bag. "As I'm a kind hearted mammal I forgive you this time. But I hope that these salads were worth the effort." She quickly took a sniff and added. "Which would be entirely possible if they are as good as they smell." The red panda opened the bag and started handing out the salads inside. "For Judy a salad with extra sliced carrots and for you a salad with crispy chicken bits."

She quickly gave her coworkers theirs and opened up her own with extra sliced bamboo shoots slices. As the red panda took a bite from the bowl she had to admit that her coworkers hadn't lied about the quality of the food. It was heaven and while she was miffed that she was soaked it at least had been worth it.

* * *

After finishing their lunch, they were about to resume their patrol when dispatch notified them that Weaselton had been arrested by their coworkers and to return and continue their assigned patrol route. Nick affirmed that they had gotten the message and Judy drove them back to Savanna central.

"So seeing as we've got some time before we're back at central do you mind if I ask you a question?" Nick looked over his shoulder to look at Cindy. They had been talking to the panda all morning, but they still didn't know a lot about her.

She nodded her consent as she didn't feel like she had anything to hide. "Sure ask away, but don't even think about asking my weight or any crap like that." Cindy had seen and heard Nick's shenanigans while talking and dealing with Judy and was not really in the mood to put up with his jokes at the time.

"Shame those questions are the most fun." Nick held up his paws at Cindy's scowl. "But seriously though if you don't mind me asking what made you want to become a cop?" It was the question he was always asking their coworkers as he found that there were many good reasons and it seemed that everyone had a different one.

Cindy thought for a moment and the fox noticed that her face showed a bit of anger before she answered a bit darkly. "When I was young me, and my dad went shopping. It was a cold winter evening, and we had taken a shortcut to get home quickly as we had gotten take away. We were almost at the other end when we got mugged by a skunk looking for a quick score. Dad handed over his wallet, but for some reason, the bastard still stabbed him pretty badly in the leg. He was probably trying to prevent dad from following him, but the dagger cut some nerves in his leg. After the police showed up and dad was brought to the hospital the doctors did all they could, but they couldn't heal all of the damage that the cut had caused to his leg. Even to this day, my dad has to walk with the help of a cane as his leg is still giving him trouble. So I wanted to become a police officer, so no other people had to fear getting hurt by criminals anymore."

Nick nodded understanding the reason. "That's certainly a good enough reason, and I'm sorry about your dad's injury." He had to think back to his own father and the stories he told him about getting robbed once. Luckily for him, the robbers had just taken the money and ran, but it was still something that even now made him cautious when dealing with unknown mammals.

"It took a while, but dad learned to deal with it. He still likes to take long walks even though he grumbles about requiring more time for the same distance. Still, the bastard that did it to him must hope that he never meets up with me again or I'll make sure he knows the error of his ways." At the last sentence, her eyes had almost narrowed to slits, and the anger in her sapphire eyes was virtually palpable.

His ears flicked as he noticed her last statement and glancing over to Judy saw by the twitching of her nose that she had seen it as well. If the anger and fury were as bad as he feared that it was, it could lead to problems further down the line. But for now, he decided to just pay extra attention to her demeanor and attitude. It would be better to discuss what he suspected with Judy when they got home. If it were what he doubted they would need to decide if they had to get Bogo involved for counseling sessions for her.

The last hours of the patrol of Savannah Central went smoothly without any worthwhile events, and as they drove back to the precinct, Nick and Judy were back to their banter. All the while Cindy had slowly relaxed again and listened to the banter of her temporary partners was starting to throw in her own quips here and there.

As they neared the precinct, Nick greeted a familiar fennec fox with sunglasses in passing who was conversing with a skunk next to his delivery van. Even though the fox enjoyed his new partnership, he still held warm memories about his old one. Glancing back, he saw the angry look the skunk was throwing in their direction as well as the fact that Cindy had a furious look in her eyes again and was looking back as well.

"He is someone you know?" Thinking about the mammal Finnick had been talking to he couldn't remember ever seeing the skunk before, and that was pretty unusual as Nick knew almost everybody that Finnick associated with as he had been part of that scene for a long time.

"No one I wish to remember," Cindy said as she sat back in the seat and closed her eyes looking like she felt exhausted. Several emotions were clearly visible on her face and Nick remembering their earlier conversation thought that he needed to ask for clarification. Right before he could, though Judy put a paw on his leg and shook her head. Whatever was bothering their coworker was not something they should be badgering her about as it would be better if she came to them with it.

He saw the wisdom in his girlfriend's demeanor, but it was still frustrating to not be able to help the red panda with her troubles. Nick puffed out a breath and sat back in his seat while Judy drove the cruiser into the precinct parking area.

* * *

 **EARLIER THAT DAY**

Harris having a terrible first day was glad for his delayed lunch break. He found a local food stand that served both preds and prey as well as having a reasonable diversity of meals to choose from. He decided on his lunch and while walking with it decided to sit down on a bench overlooking the pond. The park was beautiful and lively, and the smiles of the mammals in the park brightened his day. He had eaten about half of his baby carrot sandwich when he heard the sound of sirens getting closer. Looking towards the direction the sirens came from, he saw a weasel running into the park with a tigress in police uniform right behind him. Harris didn't have long to react but knew that he had to try to assist. While trying to stay in cover to keep hidden from the criminal he headed for some bushes that were located in the direction the suspect was heading, Harris looked for the best point to intercept and knelt down. When the weasel got near where he was hiding in ambush, the hare jumped from his hiding place and quickly tackled him.

Weaselton was never really a fighter, but he sure wasn't a pushover. As he tried to kick his captor off, he noticed the long ears and groaned. "Great another bunny on the force as if one wasn't enough pain in the tail."

"Police! You're under arrest buddy and it's hare thank you very much!" Harris took a couple of hits from the weasel's legs before the tigress had caught up and subdued the weasel. While cuffing Weaselton the officer made sure to check if her smaller coworker had been hurt. Seeing that the hare was still okay she spoke up. "Thanks for the assist new guy. We saw this perp try to pickpocket a hippo before he noticed us coming up."

Harris nodded rubbing the aches in his arm and chest where the kicks of the weasel had landed. "No problem glad to be of help."

The tigress offered a paw to help him up. "We never got a chance to get acquainted this morning. Nadine Fangmeyer."

The hare smiled and grabbed the paw that was offered and quickly was lifted to his feet. Standing on his feet again he started to dust himself off making sure to introduce himself as well. "Harris Umbra it's nice to meet you."

At that moment a wolf in uniform came up to them. He seemed to have run to get there seeing as he was panting a bit. "Hey, partner of mine you got the perp?" He asked Fangmeyer as he took over the weasel.

"Yep, the new meter maid helped me out!" At this, the tigress gave Harris a wink indicating that she was just joking around

The wolf chuckled before introducing himself. "Nice to meet you I'm Ralph Wolford. We'll be seeing enough of each other, I think, at the precinct." Harris felt the welcoming atmosphere coming from his co-workers and felt sorry that he had missed the briefing that morning as he could have spent some time getting to know these two officers as well as the others he would be working with.

The introductions finished the cops took the weasel back towards their patrol car, and Harris returned and sat back down on his bench to eat the last of his lunch. When he finished he saw that his shift was coming close to be completed. Umbra still had a couple of hours left though and the hare decided to set a route that headed towards the precinct. He didn't feel up to handing over any more citations though as he had already gotten over two hundred of them.

* * *

Finishing his shift Harris had parked the joke mobile and given the meter maid vest and the keys back to Clawhauser. The reception desk officer had been kind enough to remind Harris of his appointment with the chief. Not that it had been necessary as Harris had been dreading the talk all day. Now he was sitting outside the office of the chief while waiting to be called for what he correctly assumed would be a dressing down to properly demotivate him to be late again.

The door opened, and the chief looked at him. "Come." Harris gulped as he walked into the office and got in one of the seats in front of his desk. "You wanted to see me after my shift, sir?"

Bogo looked Harris over and nodded. He felt he needed to discipline the recruit properly, but chief Bogo also knew that his temper had got the better of him and he'd been unfair in the morning briefing by dismissing the hare without giving him a chance to explain himself. "Yes, officer Umbra. Before getting into why I had you come in though I've seen a report that states that you assisted in the arrest of a pickpocket in savanna park." The chief looked at Harris over his glasses.

The hare thought back about the incident and looking back wondered if it could have been construed to him having abandoned his assigned post. "Yes, sir. I'm sorry if it seemed like I abandoned my post, but in my defense, the suspect was heading in my direction, so I just couldn't let him pass me by without trying to help."

Bogo lifted his hoof to stop the young officer. "Don't worry you're not in trouble for that. In the past, I berated another officer for doing the right thing, and I still regret it." The chief let the memory of that moment when he had berated Hopps for arresting a shoplifter come back to him for a moment before he continued. "I Believed I was doing what was just, but in hindsight, it was my prejudice. A small mammal could never hope to measure up to a larger one. At least that was what I believed till she and her partner showed me that I was dead wrong and learning from what they showed me l try not to berate my men again for doing what is right as a police officer."

Harris let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding and felt some of the tension leave his body. "Thank you, sir."

The chief nodded again. The hare had been very helpful according to the report, and the chief could see that Umbra had the makings to become an excellent officer. Still, the issue with being late had to be dealt with as he couldn't let that one go. It would set a dangerous president and the Celestials knew keeping Wilde in check was hard enough. "However officer Umbra you being late on your first day is not a good start of your career and I expect you to be punctual in the future is that understood?"

The young officer's affirmation came so quick that Bogo was sure the young mammal had been secretly been afraid of losing his job. "It's crystal clear sir it won't happen again."

Bogo managed to hide his smile. The hare had received the message, and the chief shouldn't have to worry with tardiness in the immediate future. "Good to hear. Starting from tomorrow onwards, you will join your fellow classmate on the beat. I've assigned you two to a couple of officers you will meet tomorrow."

Harris gave a sharp salute and got off the seat. "Thank you, sir, I won't let you down." Still standing at attention the hare waited to see if the chief had anything else to add.

Bogo started to read through the daily reports and replied. "See that you don't. That's all for now so dismissed." Harris understood that he was let off for the day and quickly left the office to go home and relax. Passing the front desk, he gave Clawhouser a wave goodbye and leaving the lobby promptly made his way to the subway.


	4. Chapter 3 - Evening at home

**Chapter 3: Evening at home.**

With their shift ended the partners split up heading to their respective locker rooms. Nick walked off to the males side while Judy and Soniko headed off to the females. Once inside Cindy had to look for her locker, seeing as it was her first day but found it rather quickly located a couple of lockers down from Judy's.

As she opened it she noticed that Judy had already stripped her uniform and having a towel wrapped around herself was heading into the showers. After the doe turned the shower on, she made sure the temperature was just right before stepping in. While she lathered up, she addressed the panda who was struggling with the clasps that prevented her from removing her vest. "Well, apart from a rather boring first day and you getting rained on was it everything you hoped for?"

Cindy finally succeeding with removing the cursed vest started to unbuttoned her shirt. "It has been fantastic thank you. Apart from how slow it was though is it always like that?"

The doe turned the heat up a little and began to rinse the soap out of her fur as she enjoyed the warm water. "No, sometimes it gets downright dull." As she saw the face of the red panda fall, she had to laugh. "But no seriously it's 20 percent paperwork, 5 percent excitement and 75 percent of patrolling."

The panda finally having undressed hung her uniform into the locker and grabbed a towel. "So 95 percent boredom to 5 percent excitement?" She had to smile though as the reality behind the numbers probably meant that excitement equaled mammals being in harm's way.

Judy was already rinsing the last soap out of her fur as Soniko entered the shower. "Pretty much, but while patrolling you sometimes get to interact and help the mammals of Zootopia and bringing smiles to their faces makes the boredom worth it." The doe thought lovely about her fox and the smiles he brought to the children and mammals he helped.

Cindy nodded at that and took notice that Judy had already finished showering as the doe shook herself a little to remove excess water. "Wow, you showered fast. You late for a date or something?"

"Nah I'm heading home with Nick, but if I hurry, I can get in some gossip with Clawhauser before Nick finishes showering." She grabbed her towel and quickly dried off before walking towards her locker. Her statement seemed to have gotten the interest of the red panda who looked up at the mention of the name.

"The Receptionist? Does he have such a wealth of information then?" Cindy was already excitedly thinking up ways to chat up the feline as getting insight into her coworkers could make the task of befriending them all that much more comfortable.

Judy having dried herself put on her trousers. "You bet. If it's juicy and mammals don't want it to be known all over the precinct, there is a good chance Clawhauser already knows it." With that she checked her clothing and confirming that everything was perfect, she said goodbye to her coworker, grabbed her wallet and her keys and headed for the reception to gossip with her favorite gazelle-fan.

Being left alone Cindy resumed lathering up her fur, but her thoughts turned towards the end of her shift. Namely to the mammal, she had seen, and as she finished lathering up and moved on to rinse out the suds made a mental note to find out where he currently lived so she could pay a visit to her dear old 'friend.'

* * *

An hour later Nick and Judy entered their shared apartment. It had been a couple of months ago that they had confessed their love for each other. And while they had vowed to take things slow, as neither of them had much experience with relationships, they had realized that keeping two apartments would be a significant waste of money. Getting one apartment for them both meant they could share not only the rent but also the household tasks. As a bonus they got lucky and the apartment they had managed to get turned out to be much nicer than their apartments too.

Not only did they save on rent and had nicer living quarters, but they could share a ride to the precinct too. Judy had bought a cheap, sensible car (with the help of Nick) and while it was not the biggest on the block (even considering their size), it could comfortably hold both her and Nick. There also was enough room in the back seat for a couple of passengers to sit comfortably (although the smaller size meant that there was almost no room for baggage).

The two of them had decided to go out for dinner as neither of them had been in any mood to cook. Judy threw her keys into the key bowl and wanting to get out of her work clothes headed towards their shared bedroom. Nick felt a little drowsy and went towards the kitchen instead to make a pot of coffee to wake himself. "Carrots I'm gonna make some coffee you want some too?" He started pouring water into the machine and grabbed the coffee tin from the counter. Judy bought the tin because she loved the pattern of smiling carrots in different poses that went all around it. After opening it, he measured out the right amount for a couple of cups and took a sniff enjoying the aroma, after finishing putting the coffee into the filter he turned the maker on.

Her reply came from behind the door. "None for me thanks if I have too much caffeine this late I'll never get to sleep, but could you put a kettle for some tea on for me?"

"Sure hon. Hot water for tea coming right up!" With that, Nick opened the kitchen cupboard and grabbed the kettle. He loved living together with Judy. Nick loved the way she felt as he woke up with her in his arms, he loved how she looked all ruffled up before her morning brush and how she could look at him with her beautiful purple eyes filled with love that made him feel like he was the luckiest mammal alive. Going to work together, spending the day together and finally coming home together. He loved every minute of it, and it would be a very very cold day in hell indeed before he would allow anyone or anything to come between them to ruin this happiness he found in her embrace.

The source of his musings left the bedroom, and while he looked at her, he found himself mesmerized once again. She had already gotten into her silk pajama's and was moving towards him. The material showed all the lines of her figure while keeping just enough of it hidden to keep him guessing how she would look without them. Even though he found her beautiful beyond words and as arousing as a wildfire, it was still a sure thing that the most they would be doing that evening would be a lot of cuddling and some heavy kissing. They both loved each other, and they would end up mating of that there was no doubt in their minds, but for now, they were both contents to enjoy this time together. Both enjoyed the teasing and flirting with each other, and it would be a waste to just rush past this phase. Plus they also got a kick at seeing how far they could push the excitement of their mate.

"See anything you like slick?" The doe softly hugged the reynard and standing on her toes gave him a soft kiss.

"Just my beautiful girlfriend." Nick softly hugged her back and pulled her in for a deep kiss that left them both breathless. "Did I already tell you how much I love you today?"

Judy pretended to think about this question and with a devilish twinkle in her eyes kissed Nick on his nose. "You know I believe you forgot to mention it this afternoon." At this statement, the fox had a playful shocked expression.

"Ah, my apologies my beautiful Carrots. I must have been distracted by my duties as a role model for the next generation of police officers." Nick kissed her on her head before nibbling a bit on one of her ears. He had found out her ears were very sensitive and it had become one of his favorite ways of bothering her.

The doe closed her eyes and gave a little whine. "Niiiick please stop that you know what that does to me!." She softly thumped him on his shoulder, and he released her ear before moving his muzzle down so he could whisper to her.

"Yeah I know, but you know the rules we have set up. First to drag the other to bed loses." The bet, while made during the first weeks of their relationship, had turned out sort of a safety measure against them starting the next phase of their relationship. They both realized shortly after implementing it that doing so meant that the one who started it lost and if there was one thing that the fox and bunny both hated it was to lose. Still, both were also determined to make sure that the other one would lose control, meaning it became a game of arousing their mate while trying to stay calm and collected themselves.

Just as Judy was contemplating how to go about her counterattack the shrill whistle of the tea kettle jostled them from the slowly steaming up makeout session, and Nick went over to turn off the stove. He looked back at his mate and was pleased to see that a blush still darkened her ears. "I'm pretty sure I'll be winning that bet when this is all over fluff."

Judy scoffed and put a paw on her hip then proceeded to bend over a little to let her pajama accent her curves. She gave her boyfriend a smirk as she indeed heard him gulp as he looked her over. "At the risk of repeating myself. Ahum. See anything you like loverboy?"

"I do believe you are trying to cheat my lovely bunny." Nick had turned around to pour himself a cup of coffee and at the same time try to pull himself together as much as was possible. His girlfriend, while still being new to the field of dating, had certainly been quick to learn the arts of seduction. "What kind of tea do you want Carrots?"

"Do we still have vanilla flavor left?" If one thing was for sure, it was that they desperately needed to do some grocery shopping. The weekend before had seen them too busy as they decided to make a start with redecorating their apartment finally. The first room they chose to do first was the extra bedroom. Not having much use for an additional bedroom they decided that, for now, it would serve as their office for the times they needed to catch up on paperwork, but didn't feel up to finishing it at work. This way they could do it when they got home and have it ready when they had to report back.

Sadly the work on the room had taken them longer than they expected and when they discovered how late it had become the grocery store had closed. It had been worth it though as the new office space looked great and the only thing it needed was for them to buy the desks and furniture to finish it.

Nick checked the cupboard in the kitchen. "You're in luck there are a couple of bags left, but I'm gonna pop out to get some groceries after I finish my coffee. Anything we're out of I don't know about?"

Judy quickly went through her mental checklist of stuff they needed and quickly made a list of items for Nick to restock. "This should be all we need to last us through the week. We can get the rest when we're off this weekend." She gave him the list and accepted the cup of tea that he had made her. Smelling the heavenly aroma, she walked to the couch and turned on the tv. Nick downed his coffee then grabbed his wallet and keys before kissing Judy. After their kiss, the bunny settled back on the couch to enjoy her program while Nick opened the front door and left to get the groceries they needed.

* * *

Cindy in the meanwhile had taken Judy's words to heart and had taken the opportunity to get to know the portly receptionist before going home. As they chatted about her first workday as well as Clawhausers first day on the force the panda found out that the cheetah not only knew every cop that was working in the precinct but that just as Judy had foretold knew amazing facts about his coworkers as well. While Clawhauser was still a bit tightlipped about most of these facts he couldn't help to let slip little bits of info that the red panda made sure to remember for the future when she would try to befriend said mammals.

Just before leaving she remembered what she intended to do the next day and asked the friendly cheetah if he could look up an address up for her. "No problem Soniko. Any reason why you need this address?"

Seeing as the force might frown on confronting mammals with clean records the panda kept her reason vague. "Saw an old friend and was thinking about looking him up over the weekend." While not entirely a lie it was still far from the truth.

Clawhauser took notice of the fact that the red panda before him wanted to visit a male friend and giving her a sly wink looked into his terminal if he could find the address to the name she provided him. As he saw it, he printed it out for her and waved goodbye as she left for the night.

Cindy felt kind of bad for lying about why she had needed the address, but she required to have a confrontation with her old 'friend.' Events at the academy had shown her that he was not the kind honest mammal she had believed him to be and wanted to make damn sure he knew that she would be watching him. This way she would make sure that he didn't have a chance to hurt anyone like the coward that had hurt her father.

As the red panda reached her destination and opened up the front door to her parent's house, she heard the excited shouts of her little brothers and soon saw them come running down the hallway. She smiled lovingly at them as they enveloped her in as tight a hug as they could manage while shouting their 'welcome home.' Her mother Lilly, following her sons, hugged her daughter as well before looking her over. "How was your first day as an officer dear?"

Cindy hung her jacket on the coat rack before answering. "It went well. The chief assigned me to some great senior officers, and I'm learning a lot from them." She knew that her little brothers worshipped Nick and Judy as the heroes of Zootopia and didn't want to give away that they were the senior officers she got assigned too. It would leave her brothers in shock if she could convince the pair to come in for coffee. At the very least it would make for a great surprise for her family.

Her mother gave her a warm smile and kissed her on the cheek before standing back up. She was happy that her daughter's first day seemed to have gone by without problems, however looking at her face she could quickly tell that not everything had gone as smooth as her daughter let on. "Good to hear you had fun, but you're not telling me something."

With that simple question, Cindy felt a chill creep up her back. Her mother always had possessed the ability to tell whether something had upset her and it had been proven time and time again that trying to lie or deflect the reason for her being upset would only lead to more probing until her mother got the answer. Feeling exhausted by the day, the red panda decided that the least painful way was to suck it up and tell her mother what bothered her and hopefully have her mother satisfied with that so no further probing would ensure. "I saw Joe today while patrolling."

Her mother sighed. She remembered their old neighbors kit with the red eyes. Not only had her daughter cried her eyes out for days when she got forced to part with him, but she never again made such a close connection as she had had with him. It, therefore, confused Lilly that when they were dropping Cindy off at the police academy and saw that he was enrolling too that her daughter was less than pleased to see him.

It was months later that her daughter had come home during one of her breaks and declared that the skunk had been booted out of the academy, but refused to give the reason why. Not only that but when she went and called the skunks mother who she had kept a friendly, if distant, relationship with to try to find out what happened it seemed the relationship between their kits had soured to the point that they had become enemies.

Steeling her resolve Lilly put a paw on her daughter's cheek. "Why don't you try to patch things up between you two? As kids, you were the best of friends, and now it almost seems from time to time like you two hate each other's guts. I don't know where things went wrong or who hurt who, but this will only lead to regret later on if you lose each other because you let it fester like this!"

Cindy's gaze hardened as she remembered the locker room and the stuff found in his locker. "Mom it's ok. Joe screwed up big time and believed he could lie his way out of it. He just proved to me that what I was saying that he can't be trusted was correct." As she said it she felt the grip on her face from her mother tighten slightly as her eyes hardened as well.

"That's just dung, Cindy. You know better about him, and I believe it isn't a coincidence that you seemed to start talking badly about him right after your dad got attacked by that other skunk. If that is the reason than it's terrible that what happened with your father has given you so much anger that you are taking it out on him as well make you harbor so much distrust towards a single species." With this, she let go of her daughter's face and walked away.

Cindy held her cheek as the warmth of her mother's hand slowly faded and wondered if she was wrong in her thinking. As she thought back at that critical moment in the academy as her old friend asked her to believe him, but how could she when the evidence had been so clear and the testimony of the instructor who found them so justifiable. No, she wasn't wrong. He had felt the need to cheat to have a chance to enter the police force and had chosen to do so with forbidden narcotics. She had been more than justified in the fact that she couldn't believe in him. Now she just needed to make sure to lay down the law on him, and everything would be alright.

The panda was brought back from her musings when two small hands grabbed her, and she looked down into the faces of her little brothers. They had noticed the pained scowl that had formed on her muzzle and wanted to comfort her. Smiling she got down to her knees and hugged both boys as she tried to convince herself that the ache she felt in her chest was the result of being exhausted from her first day.

* * *

Holding two bags of groceries, Nick walked back into their apartment and saw that Judy had fallen asleep on the couch. His bunny was laying snuggling his pillow she probably had gotten from the bed to get more comfortable. The fox chuckled softly at the sight as he felt the warmth of the love he had for her. The day had been a drawn-out affair with not much happening, and on top of that, she had been the one driving the cruiser for all of it so it came as no surprise to Nick that she would have been exhausted. He quietly went into the kitchen and put away the groceries. With everything neatly stored he walked back over to the couch and softly lifted Judy. The bunny stirred a little but kept on sleeping as Nick carried her in his arms to their bed. He made sure as he laid her down that she was comfortable and covered her up before giving her a chaste kiss on the lips. "Goodnight Carrots. Sleep tight."

Taking one last look at his beautiful girlfriend, he closed the door and pulled out his phone. The events at the end of their shift were bothering him, and he knew one mammal who might have some more info seeing as it was his conversational partner that had drawn the ire of his trainee. As the number rang for the third time a gruff voice answered. "Yo. With Finnick."

"Hey, little toot-toot you miss daddy yet?" Nick couldn't help smiling waiting for the answer seeing as he knew what was coming. "You seriously want me to bite your face off don't you?"

"Ah, you hurt me. Can't a father call his favorite son anymore without risking his health and body in the process." He heard a scoff at the other side of the line. "Ok, Slick Nick spill why are you calling me so late in the evening? I'm pretty sure it's way past your bedtime."

The reynard decided not to joke around too much as what he needed to ask was something he wasn't sure the little fennec was willing to share. "Yeah about that. When we passed each other today, I noticed you were talking with someone. This mammal set off a trainee that's under my wing, and I was wondering if you had any info on him you would be willing to share as I need to figure out what's the deal with them."

The line stayed quiet for a while, and Nick was afraid that he wouldn't be getting the help that he asked for when the fennec spoke up. "You noticed that too huh? Pissed of the mammal I'm currently partnered up with I can tell you that. As what's the deal with them I can't tell you much about that. What I can tell you is that his name is Joe Fragrance, and he apparently was kicked out of the police academy for drug abuse. My best guess is your trainee knew him. Before you start wondering I just asked what was up with them, but he started talking about the academy as he wanted me to know. He probably tried to prevent there to be surprised further down the road. If you wonder how we met you can blame Honey as she sends him my way to talk about an application I had out for a delivery mammal."

The fox had to blink a couple of times. "Another delivery mammal? I knew you two were busy with starting up that delivery service. Business must be good if you need more personnel already." The soft growl from the other side showed that the little fox was irritated. "Whatever mammals want to be carried they come for our service more and more dirt for brains! Plants, blankets, toys, hell even ice cream if you can believe it we move it all and things just have been getting more and more hectic as time goes by."

Nick secretly let out a breath of relief that his friend was this successful. While he hadn't been thinking about it lately, it was always in the back of his mind when he went to the academy that one day he could end up having to arrest Finnick for breaking the law. The thought that he would have to be the one that put the cuffs on his lifelong friend had kept him awake at night at times during training. Therefore it had come as a significant surprise when Honey and Finnick declared that they would start a delivery business together with Honey keeping her research projects going to earn some extra cash while Finnick would be responsible for the delivery side of the company. "That's good to hear, but where does Honey know him from then?"

"From what he told me it seems he got wrangled into it by his mother. She and Honey were acquaintances, and she had heard that Honey was looking for someone to fill the position." Honey Badger had been Nick's other friend when he was still a hustler and although Honey had never been one to skirt the edge of the law like Nick and Finnick did it she had always been somewhat out there with her conspiracy theories. During her school years, her beliefs chased away most mammals. While it didn't give her a lot of friends, the badger could at least be sure that the few she had would be for life.

What the fennec said next though made Nick frown as the implications as the info showed that there was more to the story and it could lead to trouble in the future. "Nick we've both seen kids on drugs before and believe me when I say that I believe the guy when he claims that he didn't do them."

Nick had to shake his head at that. They both had indeed seen enough mammals that had thrown their lives away doing the vile stuff, but they had also been fooled enough times by said mammals who claimed that they would go clean. "Finn, we both, know that users will always use every excuse in the book to pretend that they aren't using or that it isn't a problem and you know how sincere they can be when they want too."

"Yeah, but we also both know the telltale signs of drug use and believe me when I say that he doesn't show any of them. He claims to be framed and hearing his side how that went down I can't say that I'm not skeptical about the expulsion. I'll admit there isn't any clear way anyone would benefit with getting rid of him, but that something wasn't right is for sure."

Nick was walking back and fro through his living room as he was trying to think about what it all meant for them and how the expulsion fitted into the big picture, but he realized that there weren't enough of the puzzle pieces to even start fitting it all together. "Thanks, Finn. While this info doesn't help me directly, I can at the very least look into what happened at the academy. If he was using on training grounds and got caught, a simple drugs test should have been used to determine his guilt. I'll check and come back to you with the results, so you know for certain what kind of mammal it is you are going to be employing."

Finnick was chuckling at that. "Ok, Nick while I'm sure Honey, as well as me, appreciate you looking into this I have to tell you something first. You see I already asked Honey to put our recruit through the ringer, and that includes putting him through a drugs test of her making. We do need to have evidence he's been clean if this blemish on his past was brought up by clients."

The fox had to concede that his old partner was covering all his bases, but that didn't mean that he didn't need to do the academy's investigation anyway. "Good knowing you're careful at least Finn. Say hello to Honey for me and goodnight."

With that, Nick ended the call and thought about what he had learned. If the skunk had been Soniko's fellow cadet, her anger could be more understandable in combination with her past, but Nick felt there was more there and with the fact that drugs were on academy grounds he found himself unwilling to let this one go.

First thing in the morning he would fill Judy in on all he had learned from Finnick. She almost every time gave him a new insight or something he hadn't thought about at all. Nick also needed to inquire with Clawhauser about the events at the academy. If there had been any rumors about that fact it was a sure bet that the round cheetah at the reception desk would have heard. If not that it would be sure that he could search for that in the records to see what info could be learned. With his tasks for the next day decided Nick turned off the lights and went to crawl into bed next to his sleeping mate. As her smell softly calmed his senses, he softly and carefully pulled her to him and snuggling up with her fell into a comfortable sleep.


	5. Chapter 4 - Ready for another day

**Chapter 4: Ready for another day.**

Soniko woke up to the sound of her alarm clock going off and stretched while letting out a big yawn. She didn't have any problems with waking up so early in the morning seeing as the time at the academy had her up way earlier to the lovely voice of the major yelling in her ear that she died again that morning. In comparison to that getting to wake up every morning at six thirty was like sleeping in for the red panda. Finally shutting off her alarm Cindy stood up and feeling the early call of nature moved to grab fresh underwear from her dresser before she headed towards the bathroom.

The house had cooled off considerately during the night and seeing as she only slept in a thin night-shirt she felt a bit on the cold side. However, she had never been comfortable in anything more than her night-shirts to sleep in as any extra clothing was either too warm, too uncomfortable or both for her taste. Hell if she had the freedom to choose to go entirely in the fur then it was the way to go when it came to her night rest, but the fact that she lived with her parents and her two younger brothers who had no concept of privacy or personal space meant a necessity for covering herself up.

The lack of freedom over what she wore to bed was not a big issue for her as she was planning to move out soon anyway. This seeing as the boys had grown up enough that her parents could deal with them so her leaving at this point wouldn't inconvenience them now in any way. It hadn't been that Cindy couldn't have gone before if she had felt the need too, seeing as her parents were more than capable of raising her brothers. But she wanted to be there to enjoy being part of the family for a while longer with a bonus of seeing her siblings grow up.

This arrangement also meant that she could help her mother out with the housework too giving her something to do while she was waiting on the academy. Now though with her job at the zpd, Cindy felt the growing need for a living space of her own. Not only would she have coworkers and friends coming over for visits, but in the likely event that she started dating she would need to have more privacy than her bedroom at her parent's house could provide.

Cindy reached the bathroom and went ahead to relieve herself and then stepped into the shower to wash up for the day forward. As she lathered up, the red panda remembered that she needed to make a stop on her way to the station to visit the address she had gotten from the friendly cheetah. There was a chance that her old classmate's employer was already in the know who he had hired, but it couldn't hurt to make sure the skunk knew he was being watched so he would keep his nose clean. Washed and with clean underwear on, she walked back to her room to collect her uniform. On the way, she bumped into her mother who had always woke up early to make them breakfast and wait for her husband to come home. Exchanging good mornings, Cindy kissed her mother on her cheek and got a nuzzle from her in return. "Good morning my big girl, did you sleep well?"

She hugged her mother strongly feeling loved. "Yeah, the exhaustion of my first day made sure of it that falling asleep was all too easy for me. It was more like passing out than sleeping if I'm honest."

Her mother let out a small chuckle at that and let go of her daughter. "I'm gonna start breakfast do you need me to fix you anything before you have to leave?"

Cindy thought for a moment. She could grab a bite to eat at any food joint on her way to the station, but having to confront her old 'friend' made that she couldn't be sure she would have the time afterward to spare. Therefore she concluded that having her mother make something for her while she dressed would solve her breakfast issues. "I'll have some eggs on toast please to go."

"Some eggs and toast coming up." Her mother gave her a loving smile and continued her walk towards the kitchen to start preparing breakfast for her family. Meanwhile, Soniko went to her room and grabbed her brush. Combing her fur was always a task that took her longer than she wanted and on this day she was already pressed for time, but on the other hand, she didn't want to show up to work looking like she forgot to groom. As she was trying to disentangle a particularly bothersome knot on her tail, she cursed at the inability of her brush to unknot the blasted strands. She was about to give up and get some scissors when she could hear the sounds of kits stampeding down the hallway outside her bedroom. The red panda sighed as she realized that said knot would have to wait a bit longer, put down her brush on her nightstand and prepared for the onslaught that would wash over her in three... two... one. The door slammed open and her brothers Jacob and Lucas came crashing through not sparing a thought for their sister's privacy, banging into said sister and tackling her in the process. She had to suppress a laugh as the boys hugged her tightly and both kissed her on either cheek as they screamed their 'good mornings' before storming off again.

The red panda checked if they had indeed moved on before she got up. Cindy felt happy knowing that her siblings were always so energetic and jubilant in the mornings even during school days. However, she had to secretly admit that she was looking forward too seeing them in another five or six years as by that time they would be dealing with puberty. That phase would see to it that they would have trouble even getting out of bed in the mornings. While Cindy had to feel sorry for her mother who would be dealing with them it was reassuring that if the officer came back to visit over the weekend, the red panda could at least be sure she would get to sleep in. Remembering her own adolescence and the trouble she made, she had to chuckle before making a mental note of herself to apologize for the problems she caused and give her mom an extra big hug before leaving. She grabbed her brush and resumed her morning grooming.

After finally getting the knots undone and finishing brushing her tail, she put on her uniform and examined herself in the mirror. She polished her badge up a bit, although it couldn't get much shinier, and checked her outfit for any wrinkles. With the talk, she was about too have she couldn't afford a messy uniform. Content with the way she looked she headed towards the kitchen where the smell of fresh coffee and eggs promised the perfect start to another day.

* * *

Nick Wilde woke up with the familiar feeling of something warm and soft hugging his chest. He smiled as he softly hugged his bunny. Judy hummed a little at the mild embrace and dug herself more into his chest. Nick always just slept with just his boxers on, and he knew Judy loved the feel of how soft his undercoat was as she had confessed as such during a cuddling session during a thunderstorm many months ago. The fox was never one to wake up early on his own, but every so often it would happen. For him, it had come as entirely a revelation that this was absolute bliss as not only would he be wide awake and energetic for the rest of the day, but as an extra bonus, he would have some time in the morning where he didn't have to do anything but cuddle with his bunny. He loved how soft she felt against his fur, and he would be laying there in absolute bliss as he waited for either the alarm to go off during those mornings or, as was more often the case, for her to wake up herself.

This morning though Nick decided that the events and information he received yesterday needed discussing and decided that he needed the extra time in the morning his waking had given him to compile his thoughts before presenting them in condensed form to his partner. The fox slowly untangled himself from Judy's grip and went on to get showered and dressed. Nick was sure his girlfriend's help would be invaluable in the investigation that he was planning. It wasn't that he desperately needed to figure out Soniko or that guy Fragrance so much, but possible problems in the academy could hurt the police department in the long run if nobody did anything about it. And anything that bothered the zpd would, therefore, hurt his bunny. Hence it became his problem.

Nick put on a kettle of water for tea and turned on the coffee, before opening the fridge and getting started working on their breakfast.

Judy woke up a short while later after reaching out and not finding the warm softness of the fur she had snuggled up minutes before. She saw there were only ten minutes left before her alarm would sound and decided to turn it off thoroughly before getting out of bed. It took a moment for her brain to start up entirely before noticing the smell of eggs and carrots. Smiling at the prospect of breakfast she quickly left the bedroom to try and locate her boyfriend and was pleasantly surprised when she found him entirely dressed in uniform and ready for the day in the kitchen. "Well look at you Slick. All up and ready to go. If I didn't know any better, I would get jealous thinking that our new partner had you hankering to get to work early."

The reynard blinked his emerald green eyes at her in confusion when he suddenly understood what she meant and waved his paws in denial while he tried to reassure his bunny. "No way Carrots. She is nice enough, but the only girl I've got eyes for is my sexy roommate."

That statement made Judy smile as she quickly hopped on the stool next to Nick and gave him a morning kiss on the cheek. "Relax honey I was just teasing you, but it's rare to see you ready for work so early." The doe took the tea her boyfriend had made for her and took a sip.

"Yeah there is something I wanted to discuss with you, and I wanted to have time to think before bothering you with it." At this, Nick looked at her with a serious expression he always had when talking about stuff he wasn't comfortable dealing with. "Judy what is your opinion on Cindy. Or in other words, what do you feel about what she told us?"

Judy knew this had been coming. They both had heard the tone of her voice as she told them the story about her father, and she had noticed the anger that had been present in Cindy's voice. It wasn't past grief simmering down it had felt as if her suffering was as fresh as the day her father got stabbed. "Nick, we both, suspect that she hasn't dealt with what happened back then. The anger she was feeling about the stabbing of her father was on full display."

Nick nodded. "What do you think Judy? Is it so bad as I fear because then we need Bogo to get involved or do we sit down with her and talk to her about our concerns? Or do you think we should wait and see how her feelings evolve before we try to help her out?" They weren't equipped to address these kinds of mental issues so involving chief Bogo would be preferable, but if they were wrong in the severity of her anger, it could lead to a breakdown of trust as Cindy would see it as her coworkers going to her boss behind her back.

The doe took another sip and thought for a minute. "At the very least we'll notify Bogo of our suspicions. It couldn't hurt to get his perspective on this. Maybe we're just overreacting seeing as her anger surprised us, and if we are, the chief will be sure to suggest some options how to proceed. Seeing as it was her father, that got hurt, it's reasonable to have residual feelings over that."

"Residual wasn't the level of emotion that I was feeling by her anger, but I can't deny that we can't say for sure what her feelings are. So we'll inform Bogo of our concerns like you suggest and let him make the call. Either he'll say we just need to monitor this or we need to sit down and talk with her."

Judy nodded her agreement. "That would be for the best. It wouldn't do anyone any good if we went off half-cocked on concerns that we are not hundred percent sure on."

"Well, there is another issue I want to talk about." Nick poured himself another cup of coffee and sat back down. "I called Finnick yesterday after putting you to bed. I wanted to talk to him about that moment that Soniko looked so angry with that skunk he was talking too."

"Hmmm. And did you learn anything from Finnick?" Judy had trouble keeping an annoyed tone out of her voice as she still was a little cross at Nick for not waking her up. She would have liked to get a bit more cuddling and kissing in before nighttime, and when she had startled awake later that evening she had not been happy with the fact they were already in bed, and Nick had gone to sleep. The only recourse available to her had been to crawl up to Nick's sleeping form and get her cuddles that way.

"He mentioned that the guy was a new hire and that the police academy had kicked him out." Nick was again looking seriously at her now as he was about to ask her help. "He and Soniko must have been in the same class, but the guy told Finnick that someone had framed him and he is sure that the skunk isn't lying and even doubts the accusations leveled against the kid of drug abuse."

"OK, but something must have happened otherwise Soniko would have said something about it right?" Judy looked at Nick with a hint of apprehension as she didn't want to believe that any form of corruption could have seeped into the academy.

"That's what worries me. Soniko seems like she doesn't like that Fragrance guy very much. What if she noticed that something was off, but didn't act on it because of her feeling?" The fox looked glumly into his coffee as he thought again about the angry face she was making at the end of their shift.

Judy nodded. If Cindy had chosen to ignore wrongdoings because of her personal feelings that fact could very well end up damaging her future career path. Willful negligence was not something the chief would likely overlook, and she knew Nick was right in worrying about that. "Ok, Slick it seems we have to look into this matter. Not only do we need to find out if something sinister is going on there, but we also need to find out if that Fragrance guy was indeed guilty of the crime and if the investigation that was performed was all above the level. Also while we're at it, we need to check if Soniko was indeed ignoring signs of anything being wrong."

They nodded to each other and finished their breakfast to get ready for the workday ahead.

* * *

Harris was woken up by the sound of three different alarms going off at the same time. He had made sure that his three alarm clocks were all different in operation. One mechanical, one on batteries and his old one on the power net. By using this method, he would be sure that if anything happened to make one of them fail, he had two different ones as a backup that, logically speaking, wouldn't. It was, as far as he could calculate, foolproof.

Racing from alarm to alarm to shut down the racket by hitting all three of them in succession. Having peace and quiet return to the room Harris opened his dresser to grab some clothes and headed towards his bathroom to clean himself up. Nothing would go wrong today. He had a hellish day yesterday, and he wanted to make sure that he didn't get parking duty again if he could prevent it.

With his fur presentable and his uniform looking pristine he grabbed the sandwiches he had made the evening beforehand and headed towards the station. Even though he had time to spare as the hare had made sure to set the wake-up time earlier than needed he wanted to make sure to leave a good impression. And arriving early would at least show his boss that he was not prone to be tardy.

Opening one of his sealed bags of food Umbra grabbed one of the sandwiches and took a bite making sure not to spill his food on his uniform while he walked. The hare had been an example of the devout bachelor, and this was not the first time he had eaten his breakfast while on the move. It wasn't that he didn't want a relationship, but he didn't like all the attachments and duties that came with them. No, for now, he just loved having his place all to himself, and apart from his friends and family (who he always made sure to visit on the weekends), he had not much need for social interaction on his off time during the week. Becoming a police officer, however, had cured him of his tendencies to make a mess and now his apartment looked cleaner than the day he moved in.

Whistling as he strolled at a leisurely pace, he took notice of the mammals going about their day and the general feel of contentment that was hanging in the air. Just after Hopps and Wilde had exposed the Nighthowler plot that former mayor Bellwether had been responsible for, the relationships between prey and predator had been on the cutting edge. It was only thanks to a concentrated effort of city hall, the zpd and stars like Gazelle (with a hint of Hopps and Wilde dashed in thanks to, at that time, their unusual friendship) had the anger slowly simmered down. Now a couple of years later you could almost swear there had never been animosity between the two groups as pred and prey got along like friendly acquaintances. Harris had to wonder though how much of this situation was an act performed by both social groups and how much of it was sincerely meant, but for now, it worked and if it kept on working even those that were acting could maybe be turned around to look at things in a new light.

Hope had returned to Zootopia and, if Harris had anything to say about it, would be there for a very long time. Still for him to make sure that that happened, the hare would need to make sure he lived up to the idea of being a full-fledged police officer. Harris passed a shop and looking at his reflection in the window had to smile at the cop staring back at him. It had taken him a lot to get to this point, and now he felt like he was on top of the world.

* * *

Cindy's mother Lilly had seen to it that all her kits had been fed and seen them off to work or school. She had noticed the way in which her daughter had quickly eaten her breakfast like she was in a hurry and with a quick kiss goodbye had left earlier than yesterday. As far as she could figure it out, it could have been because her daughter wanted to keep giving off a good impression to impress her boss, but something told Lilly that was not the case. As she pondered, her daughters hurried exit she drew a cup of tea for herself. Her husband Mark had gotten a job as a night guard at the local library and was due at home any moment now. Usually, they would eat together and then go to bed. Seeing as she always slept better when Mark was laying next to her, she still made sure to go to bed late at night so she could sleep with him for a couple of hours in the morning.

While she was happy that he found work after his operation and therapy to walk again, she still worried every night he was away that he might put too much strain on his leg. He had assured her that he only had to do rounds three to four times a night and that the library was one of the safest places to work for (who would want to steal books when you could lend them for free?). She had to admit that he had a point, but every morning until he walked through the front door, she would worry till he finally came back to her.

Thinking about the issue at hand, as she needed to discuss things with her husband about her daughter, Lilly heard the sound of keys unlocking the front door. Smiling as she welcomed her mate, she snuggled up to him and held him for a couple of seconds longer than usual relishing in the feelings of being held lovingly by his strong arms. Marks physique had suffered from the attack, but the movement therapy, as well as the body training he had to do to build up his muscles again, had left him with a body that was almost as fit before he got attacked. Lifting her head to look him in his eyes she noticed his loving smile and as he pulled her close, she closed her eyes and enjoyed the passionate kiss he gave her. After the kiss had finished, she gave him one last hug. "Welcome home honey. How was your night?"

He slowly moved towards the kitchen limping a bit more than usual as he used his cane to steady himself. "It was alright. Bit slower than normal though. The alarm was on the fritz, so we were ordered to each secure a section of the library while the technicians tried to get the system working again." Mark felt the annoyance return at the memory as the problems with the alarm had meant a lonely night with him stuck in one of the wings with almost no one to talk to. The reason for the split up of the guards was because the director in his infinite wisdom had ordered everyone to secure a different part of the building seeing as every wing was now at 'risk.' The red panda had to fill his time with walking around the room to keep his leg from cramping up. It had also been his misfortune that he had been stuck in the arm that housed the research journals. He had tried reading one or two to pass the time, but the scientific terms and the research jargon filling the pages made for a rather dull read, and he had put the books down after only a couple of pages.

Lilly followed her husband and looked worried as she took notice that he was indeed limping a bit more than usual. "Your leg bothering you again? Do you want me to warm up a hot pack?"

Mark sat down at the kitchen table and let out a sigh of relief. "No thank you, Lilly, I love you for offering, but it's alright. Having to be located in one location I didn't take care to move around enough, and my leg got stiff as a result. It improved a lot on the walk back though, so I'm grateful for that, but I have to admit that I'm looking forward to a warm shower to loosen the muscles up further."

She put his coffee in front of him and sat down at the table. "That would be for the best. Do you need me to give you a massage afterward?"

He smiled at the prospect of getting a massage from his lovely wife, but as tempting as it was Mark had developed a sense that all married men grow that tells them when their wife was worried, upset or angry. And it was saying to him now that his wife was making him comfortable because there was something that would probably upset him coming up. "I would love nothing better than the prospect of a massage from you, but having said that let's discuss what it is you need to tell me first."

Lilly sighed as her attempt to ease her husband into the problem seemed to have failed. "I wanted for you to have a chance to relax before I got into this, but Cindy said she saw Joe today. You remember him right? That young boy she always played together with when we lived next to the Fragrances."

Mark frowned as he didn't understand why that could cause a problem. He remembered the young skunk fondly as the kit and Cindy always played around and got up to mischief together. As far as the red panda could tell the two of them had been such good friends. Such good friends even that it had seemed cruel at the time to have to split them up.

He remembered with sadness the countless nights afterward he and Lilly heard their little girl crying in her bed. With those memories coming back to him he wondered why meeting up her old friend from long ago would lead to issues. "I'm having trouble seeing how meeting up with her old friend would be anything but a happy event dear."

"Well, she wrote me while she was at the academy that Joe was in her class, but the way Cindy worded it back, then it didn't seem like it was something she was happy about. Later she wrote me he got kicked out, but she didn't explain why he flunked and I assumed that he didn't make the cut. This morning I found out, however, after she let it slip, that Joe got kicked out for the suspicion of drug abuse." She looked at her husband and saw confusion adorning his face. "Cindy told me that she believed he had done it because of his character and that she couldn't trust him because of who he was." Her husband's face was conflicted at the emotions he was going through. Lilly knew that he loved his family very much and that he was aware where Cindy's changing opinions of her best friend and probably skunks, in general, had originated. She put her paw on his. "Honey I believe she's gotten confused by what happened back then, and the events that occurred at the Academy are not making things better for how she looks at things, could you take her aside this evening to have a word with her?"

Mark nodded. He had always feared that Cindy got scarred worse than she let on from that horrible incident those many years ago, but the counselors he had taken her too never found anything that they were worried about and told him to just give her time. Seeing as he had never seen her show any hate or distrust towards skunks he had assumed after a while that they probably had been correct and that time could indeed heal all wounds.

Now it seemed that he and the counselors had been hasty in their assessment and his daughter was suffering for his oversight. He, however, had never heard her talk negatively about skunks or her old friend so maybe Joe had been a catalyst to bringing those negative feelings towards the surface. The problem was that they were coming out in such a damaging way, but now that he knew they were there he had to make sure to try to fix the mistake he made back then in assuming everything was alright. "I'll see if I can get her to talk to me this evening after dinner before I head back to work. There is always a chance that she was still reeling from meeting up with him again. Then combined with what happened at the academy might have colored her perception of him."

Lilly breathed more relaxed knowing that her husband took the situation seriously and leaned over to kiss him on his cheek. "Thank you, honey. That would take a load off my mind. Now I remember promising a certain handsome red panda that I married he would be getting a massage after his shower, but I wonder if he could be convinced to have someone wash his back too?" At this, she started walking towards the shower while casting a look back seductively over her shoulder.

The red panda at the table stared at his wife then in one fluid motion grabbed his coffee and downed it in one gulp. Then he stood up slowly, took a deep breath and raced after her as quickly as his bad leg and crutch allowed him to.


	6. Chapter 5 - Changing plans

**Chapter 5: Changing plans.**

Bogo was deep in thought as two of his smallest officers were currently sitting in front of him. Hopps and Wilde had requested a meeting and had brought some concerns they had to his attention. The concerns, however, were about the rookie he had just assigned to them. Officer Soniko was the valedictorian of her year and had passed all psychological, and mental tests as well as all physical ones.

"Hopps, Wilde while I appreciate that you've brought your concerns to me first before doing anything else I must stress that officer Soniko has passed all tests like all the rest of us and no issues like the ones you have brought forth ever came up or got reported."

Judy straightened out and made sure she had the Chief's full attention before continuing. "We understand that you can't just go up to her and suggest to undergo counseling on a hunch and it's indeed just something that we noticed while out on patrol. However, the intensity that we both felt made it seem urgent enough for us to at least feel you should be aware of it."

"I'm not berating you for your choice to inform me nor do I want to make you feel that the issue hasn't got my attention, but as for now, I want you two to just keep teaching her the ropes as you have done. If you witness more hostility towards individual civilians or believe that she lets her duties suffer because of prejudice, then, by all means, inform me of the issue."

Nick nodded. "Understood chief well keep on monitoring her."

Bogo was pleased that his officers were showing again that they were professionals. Not only had they immediately thought to bring their concerns before him, but they accepted his judgment without discussion. Now he was sure that they could handle what he had asked of them, but he would shift some of the workloads from them so they could concentrate their effort on officer Soniko. "Now because of what you had brought before me as well as certain events that occurred yesterday I've decided not to assign the second rookie to your care."

Nick and Judy were surprised by this call and wanted to protest, but Bogo just lifted his hoof and silenced them. "Now before you object let me explain myself. I want you two to concentrate on officer Soniko entirely. If you do that the second rookie would obviously get less attention and that is something that I can't allow as I want all my new officers at their best when this is over. Also, officer Umbra aided Fangmeyer and Wolford with the arrest of a suspect yesterday, and therefore I want to put him in with them as the arrest they shared would make forming work bonds between them much easier."

As the officers thought over what their chief was telling them they could only agree that this was for the best. Still, Nick wanted to see if Bogo would agree to his other plans. "Sir, may I offer a suggestion on another matter?"

The bull felt a chill go down his back as it was Wilde making the suggestion and therefore it was suspect. "Ok, Wilde let's have it."

Wilde put on his best hustlers face and laid out his plans for supporting the Bunnyburrow PD during the festival. He made sure to suggest the boon it would be for the training of the newest officers. When he finished, Bogo had a dubious expression. "While I agree with you officer Wilde that de BPD could use the extra help I do not yet see the value of it to officers Soniko and Umbra."

"Chief they learn to deal with crowds and the problems they can cause in a much smaller venue than the festivals taking place in Zootopia. That gives us a chance to evaluate them in a somewhat controlled situation without running the risk of overwhelming them too soon." The fox sat back into his chair looking at Bogo. He could see that the point he was trying to make had gotten across and the chance of his proposal getting accepted had risen significantly.

Bogo, on the other hand, was indeed taking in what Wilde had told him, but he was also one hundred percent sure that the fox was hustling him. It still was a sound proposal, however, and the buffalo had to concede that the experience would be indeed beneficial to his new officers. However taking a little more time to mull this over and try to figure out how Wilde was benefitting from this was still necessary. "I'll take it into consideration. Now if there are no further issues you're dismissed."

The officers stood up and saluted before opening the door and left the office.

* * *

The morning briefing proceeded without incident and while Soniko and Umbra were confused that they hadn't been partnered up with the same pair of officers. This because the chief had told them otherwise just the day before. It wasn't a problem of course, but it made them wonder what had changed.

As the teams left for their assigned routes, Nick was driving. Most of the time he would let Judy drive, but with the long, dull day yesterday and seeing how exhausted she had been yesterday he wanted to give her a chance to relax. During the afternoon he would trade places with Cindy giving her the opportunity to get to know the road and neighborhoods.

Arriving in Sahara square their assigned patrol for the day Nick planned the route they would take and the officers started looking around for signs of trouble. The morning passed without major incidents. Some parking and one speeding violation were all that they had to handle, and as lunch approached Nick and Cindy traded places, so Cindy could learn to navigate the different areas of Zootopia. It appeared that it would be a slow day again.

* * *

Clawhauser was manning dispatch when a call came in. "Zootopia police department. How can we assist you?" His eyes widened in shock when he heard the scared voice of a very young girl."

"Policeman please help my mommy." The voice sounded tiny and on the edge of starting to cry.

The cheetah immediately made gestures to his fellow dispatcher on duty, a friendly goat that had been hired a few months ago, for assistance with his call. "Of course sweety what happened with your mommy? Can you put her on the line?"

The child whimpered and said that they had been eating sweets when her mommy had made funny noises and was having great difficulty breathing and had signaled for her daughter to call for help. Clawhausers heart was breaking, but he had to keep his wits together if he wanted to have any chance to get their location to send help too. "Don't worry sweety were coming to help you. How old are you honey?"

Shuddering her reply came in little gasps as the child lost her composure a bit. "I'm four. Mommy is hurting."

"Can you tell us where you are or can you see something in the area we could use to find you."

"There is a house that looks like a round green plant with a purple flower on top and a very big house shaped like a tree." The tremble in her voice hadn't diminished, but Clawhauser managed to keep the child from panicking. The cheetah was applauding her for doing so well for her young age.

In the meantime, the goat had already gotten busy trying to triangulate where the call was originating from and informing units that were in the general vicinity with any information Clawhauser was able to get from the four-year-old.

"Ok honey where are your mom and you at? Can you see any other mammals that could help you until we arrive?"

"I and mom were waiting in the car for the shops to open."

"Good. Could you tell me what color your car is darling? And do you know where mommy parked her car at."

"It's red, and mommy parked it where almost nobody parks, there is nobody here now."

"Parking lot somewhere near the casino," Clawhauser was informed by his coworker of this new piece of info, and the goat quickly got back on the radio to inform the search parties.

Judy, Nick, and Cindy were in the meantime desperately looking for the child and mother. There were a couple of buildings shaped like how the little girl had described them and at none of the places they tried did they see anyone in trouble.

The radio came back alive. "All units that are currently involved in the search please be informed that the child has described their location as being in a deserted parking lot. They are sitting in a red car, and the mother was waiting for the shops to open before she started choking. Also, be advised that triangulation shows them to be in the vicinity of the casino."

Nick quickly began shifting through his memories to see which locations fit the bill, and only one came up that would let the child see the buildings she saw in the vicinity of the shops. "I think I know where they are. Inform dispatch and put on the sirens." Judy advised dispatch that they were moving, to check out Nicks deduction and Cindy hit the sirens and stepped on the gas while the fox called out directions to follow.

Ten minutes later they drove into the parking lot of the Gobi's retreat shopping mall. The officers quickly started scanning all the cars, but for all the colors on display, a red one wasn't among them.

Nick tapped Soniko on her shoulder. "There is a smaller one at the back of the mall almost nobody uses it, because of the distance to the entrance, but it has a playing ground there so the mom could have gone there. Cindy nodded and quickly steered the cruiser towards the lot.

As they arrived, they immediately spotted the red car as it almost was the only car in the lot. They saw a coyote struggling in the driver's seat with a very young girl next to her with a phone to her ear.

"Dispatch this is ten-Nora-fifteen, please be advised that we have found the child and mother in distress, we need an ambulance send to the Gobi resort mall."

"Understood ten-Nora-fifteen ambulance is on its way."

Cindy parked the cruiser, and the officers quickly exited the car. Judy headed over to the young girl as the other two cops opened the door and started trying to help the mother with her breathing troubles.

Judy opened the passenger door and smiled at the child to calm her down. "Hey, honey. Shall we go to the side so the other officers can help your mommy?" The girl nodded slightly at her and grabbed Judy's paw as she got out of the car. "May I speak to the officer on the phone?" The girl nodded again and gave Judy the cell phone.

"Hopps, do you have the child?"

"Yeah, Clawhauser. Nick and Soniko are working to try to free the mother's airway, but you can disconnect the phone call well keep in radio touch."

"Ok, good luck. I'll stand by on radio." With that, the line went down, and Judy turned off the phone.

In the meantime, the other officer's had gotten the mother out of her seat and noticed she was barely conscious at that point. Nick quickly laid her down and got on top of her. Placing his hands on her abdomen, he pushed down starting to apply the Hamlich maneuver. After a set of quick upwards stomach compressions, Soniko saw that the Coyote was trying to throw up the candy and as she succeeded quickly turned her in a stable recovery position. After the coyote was lying on her side, gasping for breath, Nick immediately informed dispatch that they succeeded in clearing the airway.

Judy had been consoling and distracting the distraught pup and when she heard that her mom could breathe again told the child that her mommy was ok, but they were going to bring them both to the hospital to make certain. At that moment they heard the telltale sound of sirens rapidly approaching, and a couple of seconds later an ambulance appeared around the corner.

After that, the ambulance personnel quickly loaded the coyote on a stretcher and put her in the ambulance while Judy decided to go with the child as they accompanied her mother. Nick and Cindy would follow as soon as they had established the identity of the woman and daughter by going through her purse to check for an id and called in her plates. After they had gotten a possible id and cross referenced it with the id they had found they made sure that the car of the family was secured and locked before heading for the hospital. In the meantime, Clawhauser finding the family name in the phone book notified the family of what had happened.

* * *

Judy had managed to calm the pup down and let her rest. The child was lying on a bench with her head on the pillow the officer had gotten her. The mother had come around during the drive there and was even fully awake when they arrived at the hospital, but with the candy lodged in her throat for some time, the doctors wanted to make sure no damage had been done and ran several tests.

Without anyone else of her family present, Judy had the duty to verify that the pup was safe till her family showed up. After she made sure that the child was comfortable with her pillow and was taking a nap, she grabbed a coffee from the machine in the waiting room and sat back next to her while waiting for either Nick or the family to show up.

As she took a sip, she looked around and was reminded of that evening all those months ago when she heavily leaning on Nick walked or rather limped into the hospital after having managed to expose Bellwether and solving the Nighthowler case. Bogo had driven them personally to the hospital himself, and the medical team had been ordered to give her and Nick the complete package of tests as the chief didn't want to leave anything to chance anymore. Judy had received stitches for her leg, and they both had been examined to determine if they had suffered any injuries as a result of being slammed into the pit.

Judy smiled at the memory as she remembered Nick and how concerned he had acted that evening. They were both going through those tests, but he always wanted her to go first. She had feared that he would split when she had those exams, but he was always there waiting for her, and he always looked a bit anxious even though she had to admit you wouldn't have seen it if you didn't know where the holes were in his mask. Looking back now it probably was around then she started to have feelings for him. The concern he was showing as well as the moment he had opted to stay with her when she couldn't escape by herself made her feel cared for, and that probably had been the spark to ignite the love she felt for him today.

Then had come the many many days of questioning. Not only of what had happened but also the methods they had used and the manner they had conducted their investigation in. At that moment the attorneys of Bellwether would be going after everything that wasn't done properly in a bid to get the trial thrown out. Luckily Judy hadn't been a cop anymore, and Nick wasn't one, to begin with, so they hadn't been a large threat to the proceedings as they hadn't been subject to any regulations.

Chief Bogo, however, had made a huge point on how they were to testify about how they had gotten the location of the lab. He was pretty sure that the fact they had a mob boss threaten to 'ice' a mammal into confessing, could lead the attorneys to try to blame them for framing the former mayor. Especially with Nicks colorful past, even though he hadn't done anything against the law he had been so close to crossing it that it wouldn't be a stretch that the jury could turn towards that explanation.

Judy was woken up from her ramifications suddenly when a couple of elder coyotes came into the waiting room and quickly approached them. As the bunny tried to identify who the coyote's where, and how they were related to the victim, the pup who had been napping sprung up. "Granny!" The female coyote quickly picked her grandchild up and squeezed and kissed her while the pup jubilantly kissed her back. The male looked at the pair smiling before switching his attention back to Judy. "Thank you for watching her officer. Are you the one who helped my daughter?"

The bunny shook the paw he offered and smiled. "I was one of the officers that responded yes, but it was my partners who saved your daughter while I took care of your granddaughter."

"Where are your partners if you don't mind me asking I would like to shake the paws of the officers who saved my daughter." The coyote looked around quizzically.

"They are on their way here, but first they had to find your daughter's identity to be able to notify you and your family of what had happened." Judy was wondering how long it would be for Nick and Cindy to arrive. She felt she had been at the hospital for at least a half hour, and if they found out the woman's identity, it couldn't have taken them more than fifteen minutes to get there. Just as she finished that thought, she heard the familiar voice of the fox she had been expecting.

"Hi, Carrots did you miss me?" She looked around and met his emerald eyes as they looked lovely at her. His face looked all business, but oh those eyes. The mask he wore when dealing with the world was a work of perfection. If you didn't know where to look you would never see the emotions hidden behind it, but it was when they were alone in their shared apartment, and he let the mask down. She loved that moment when she got to see the mammal behind the mask; it was something she cherished. But even if the mask were on in full force she would still have the eyes. Full of love when they fell on her, and she could always feel her body warm up when she looked into them.

"Took you long enough Slick. Got lost along the way?" She raised an eyebrow as Cindy's ears started to blush and she began to mumble something about not knowing the area yet and unfair mentors.

"Well as you could deduce by Red's mumbling over there I decided to see how well her knowledge was of the area, but even though she isn't as knowledgeable if I had hoped she would have gotten us here in agreeable time if we didn't run into a traffic jam." At this Nick patted Soniko's back. "Seeing as she couldn't have prevented us from getting stuck in traffic, I believe she didn't do a bad job at navigating."

Judy had to shake her head at Nick's timing but decided to discuss this later without an audience. "Well, sir these are the officers that helped your daughter. If I may introduce you to officers Wilde and Soniko."

The old coyote shook the officer's paws and thanked them, but Nick noticed that for a second before shaking his, the eyes and face of the coyote showed some distrust before he squared it away behind a friendly smile. The fox shrugged it off mentally as he couldn't blame the old coyote. The prejudice was slowly declining, and Nick was showing mammals every day that a fox was more than being a shifty lowlife, but not all mammals could or even would change their preconceptions of what foxes were. He had to admit though that the grandpa at least had tried to pretend he wasn't distrustful and that was a step up from what he had been used to not even a year ago when animals just showed open contempt for him. Nick smiled and gave a friendly nod as he released the paw.

The officers excused themselves and made their way back towards their patrol car as they still had some hours left before their shift ended. As they drove off, the radio came back alive.


	7. Chapter 6 - Terror scare

**Chapter 6: Terror scare.**

Harris Umbra had found that the officers he was assigned too were fun to be around. At the briefing, his mood had soured as he learned that he wasn't going to go on patrol with Hopps and Wilde, a couple of officers he respected greatly. But during the patrol talking with the officers he got assigned to, he had soon taken a liking to them, and the slight feelings of disappointment had lifted shortly after that. The jokes and quips from the partners had been going strong all morning, making him feel welcomed and put him at ease, as he looked forward to learning from them.

The patrol itself had been a rather uneventful affair, but the officers had taken the time to show him the locations that had higher crime rates, so he would know when to look out for crimes to occur.

As Wolford was talking about a favorite spot of drug dealers to peddle their poison, they were alerted to a car on the emergency lane that looked like it had broken down. The officers pulled up behind the car and exited their vehicle. Wolford and Fangmeyer asked Harris to make contact with the driver as they wanted to see how the officer handled himself while talking to civilians.

The car design was clearly for larger mammals and Harris had to pull himself up to the window edge to look inside. When he looked inside, he heard the voice that he recognized all too easily.

"Oh look Sarah! It's that sweet, sweet bunny from yesterday! Oh, deary, I'm so happy that mean old savage lion hasn't eaten you!" The old lion beamed at him, and as Harris slowly let himself drop back, he cursed his bad luck.

As he looked back at his co-workers, he saw the amused faces of the wolf and tiger and sighed. Then jumping up and trying to pull himself upwards again he suddenly found himself swinging outward as the car door opened.

"Where has he gone? Oh, officers! Have you seen that cute bunny that was just here?" The lion waved at the pair, and Fangmeyer had to stifle a giggle while Wolford turned around to prevent the lioness from seeing him laughing.

Harris meanwhile was still hanging from the door and was not having the time of his life. Looking over the edge of the window he tried to draw the lion's attention, but she had her attention fully focused on engaging with his partners. As he debated dropping down and just having a good sulk behind the door, he heard a sweet voice chastising her grandmother. "Nana the bunny is hanging from your door please close it again so he can talk to us."

The lion turned to the driver and looked at her door. As she saw Harris, her smile was beaming, and she softly, but quickly shut the door again. As the hare officer was finally able to see inside, he got a look at the driver and suddenly found it hard to talk. He had never been into inter-species relationships, and while he didn't begrudge the mammals that were in them their dalliances Harris never figured that he would ever be in one, but the lioness that was driving the car had the most beautiful amber eyes he ever had the pleasure of seeing. "Sorry officer sometimes my gran can lose track of the situation."

"No problem..." Harris cleared his throat as the sound he was making was a wee bit on the high side. Trying to lower his voice to make it more acceptable he overshot and started an octave or two too low on the vocal spectrum. "No problem ma'am." He was kicking himself mentally. He sounded like a five-year-olds idea of an adult. Finally finding his voice again he continued. "My partners and I just noticed your car and wanted to see if you were in need of our assistance."

The old lion was still smiling as she turned to her granddaughter. "See what I mean Sarah. I told you I had found a good man for you to date." At those words, Harris would have been happier to be everywhere but there at that time. The embarrassment was bad enough, but to have those beautiful eyes and the girl they belonged to laugh at him would be too much. However, laughter was the last thing on her mind as her ears darkened with a blush. "Nana you can't just assume that every male without a ring is looking for a date!"

What Harris quickly noticed was that she hadn't objected to him personally or that he was a hare, but rather in her granny's assumption that he was interested. He stored this bit of information away for further use on a later date. "It's no problem ma'am, but back to my original question. Can my partners and I assist you in any way?"

The lioness looked a little shy as she looked at the officer. "No officer we already called the garage to come tow us. But thank you for the offer though." As she talked to him, she seemed to have a hint of sadness hanging over her, and Harris had a feeling that she would have liked a chance to speak to him without her grandma present. He stopped that thought, however, as he believed that he was just misconstruing what her demeanor meant.

Her granny though patted her leg. "Oh, Sarah you're not going to get a boyfriend like that." And with that, she grabbed her glasses and took a good look at the hare's nametag. "Officer Umbra is it? Have you got any plans for the weekend? If not now you do and if you do cancel them! I expect you to pick up my granddaughter a five Saturday evening."

The hare was a little shellshocked at that statement, and Sarah was gasping for breath as she tried to form a response to her grandmother's demand. Harris, however, looked again at her as she turned to him and saw the amber eyes looking into his. The apology was clearly visible in them as well as a hint of sadness, but also Harris noticed, and perhaps hoped for, a bit of longing.

Sometimes you get to a split in the road, and you have to choose which way to go. Harris knew he had reached one of these moments himself and he realized that the grandmother had given him a chance that would not ever come again. "Five o'clock sounds lovely, but only if your granddaughter agrees with it."

At that statement, Sarah gave a startled squeak as that was the last thing she had expected to hear. She had only recently considered dating outside her species, seeing as males in her species didn't seem to be interested in her at all, therefore she had slowly warmed up to the idea. The thought of going on a date with a rabbit though felt a little strange to her. But seeing as she hadn't had a date in ages she also quickly realized that the prospect of having a night out with any male companion was oh so much better than the option of spending another night in with her romance novels.

As the grandmother took charge and started to tell the officer her granddaughter's contact information she took another look. The eyes of the hare were a lovely lemony color, and she found that looking into them gave her an unexplained warm feeling. She had to frown at that because while Sarah had accepted that she might have to date outside of her species to find the mammal that was the one for her, she hadn't expected that her suitors would be much smaller than her. The tow car turned up just as the grandmother finished explaining to the officer how to get to their house, and the police hare said goodbye to the females with the promise to pick Sarah up at five.

His partners were looking at him with grins on their faces as he approached them and he prepared himself for the ribbing he would surely be about to receive.

"So Catsanova. Can we expect you to pick up women at every traffic stop we have you take care off or are you planning on getting the contact info of any attractive female we come across." As Wolford gave the hare a smirk, Fangmeyer chuckled and gave the hare a pat on the back.

As Harris was about to respond with what he hoped would have been a witty comeback the radio came in. "twelve-Rine-eighteen please answer."

The friendly ribbing stopped at that and Fangmayer took the radio. "twelve-Rine-eighteen reporting."

"Please respond to reports of a disturbance on Berry Street. A bar owner there called in what sounded to him like a mugging in the alley behind his bar." At this, the officers ran towards their patrol car and quickly clicked in their seatbelts. Fangmeyer turned on the sirens, and Wolford floored the gas. As the patrol car took of Harris caught a last glimpse of Sarah and saw a glimpse of worry as she watched them leave. He gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile and sat back while feelings of the warm, happy moment the hare had just undergone and the anxious feelings over the uncertainty of what he was about to walk into where fighting for dominance in his body.

* * *

The officers pulled up to the bar as an armadillo was waving them down. "Officers over here I was the one that called the emergency number!"

Getting out of the car, Umbra noticed that a crowd had formed around the entrance of the alley where the supposed mugging took place. Wolford immediately called in with dispatch to receive the support of additional units to deal with the crowd control.

Fangmeyer had in the meantime gotten a quick description of events from the bar owner and waved Harris over. "Ok I'm gonna take point with Wolford, and I want you to hang back a little to cover both of us as well as making sure that we're not at risk from the back."

Harris quickly nodded his reply and pulled out the shockgun he received from the department. The shockguns had been a recent invention that had replaced the tasers. They were able to propel a potent 'ball' of electricity towards a mammal you wished to incapacitate and depending on the guns setting could even deliver a fatal shock for the times that lethal force was authorized. The change in delivery meant that you weren't dependent of the tasers wires and could fire three round consequently before having to replace the battery making the weapon more viable for engagements with multiple assailants. The range was only marginally better than the tasers though so for long range engagements they would switch to their tranquilizer guns and rifles.

Wolford having received the message that backup was on their way quickly exited the patrol car and ran up to Umbra and Fangmeyer. "Fang you and I go in first, and Umbra covers us?"

Fangmeyer nodded. "Standard procedure. Let's not rush in till we know what we're dealing with."

At this, the two officers pulled their shockguns and set the settings to stun for medium sized mammals. Umbra set his one to medium as well and prepared to follow his partners. The officers moved through the crowd and entered the alley. It was shadowy and while it was a full sunny day it seemed rather dark. With Fangmeyer in the lead, the officers approached the first bend. The tiger looked back to her team and saw that they were ready to engage. She raised her firearm and stepped out slowly clearing the corner. When she was sure there were no attackers she made the signal for 'go' to Wolford who quickly continued down the alley towards what was the first possibility of cover in the form of some garbage bins, but before he reached them a familiar scent hit his nose, and he knew what it could mean. The alley had the thick smell of blood.

As the wolf reached the cover of the garbage bins, he quickly radioed dispatch. "twelve-Rine-eighteen reporting, please be advised we just discovered blood on the scene. Expect possible injured mammals. Also, the site is not yet secure. Repeat site is not secure."

"Understood twelve-Rine-eighteen please be advised that additional units are being sent to reinforce you. Also, EMT unit has been dispatched towards your scene also."

"Rodger twelve-Rine-eighteen out." Wolford had to take a deep breath as he now had to choose whether to stand and wait till their additional backup arrived and took a risk with the life of whoever was probably hurt while they waited. Or go in early with increased risk to him and his fellow officers. As he looked back, he saw Fangmeyer giving him a nod and knew that there was only one real way to move forwards. He aimed his shockgun at the next bend and gave his partner the sign to start going forward again.

As Fangmeyer moved up, Harris quickly looked back to make sure they had an open escape plan and that the onlookers or anyone that had darker motives weren't following them, but the crowd was content to gawk from the entrance. He also noticed the telltale sign of red and blue flashes in the reflection of the buildings on the other side of the street that announced that the first of their backup had arrived.

Harris looked back down the alley and saw Wolford give him the sign to form up with him, and he quickly went over to sit next to the wolf. The hare's nose wasn't as good as a wolf's, but even Umbra could smell that blood had been spilled and only recently too. As he took a look at the wall, he noticed several darkened wet splodges going all over it and quickly taking a look at the other side saw the same pattern there.

Quickly tapping Wolford, he quickly pointed towards the splodges, and the wolf narrowed his eyes at the marks. "What the hell happened here? Fang stay alerted; there is blood on the walls too." They saw the tiger signaling with her paw that she had understood and gave Wolford the signal to form up.

In that way, the three cops slowly moved up the alley clearing corners and making use of any available cover that dust bins and doorways provided. Al the while the scent of blood got thicker, and the walls seemed to be covered in it more and more. As the officers neared the final bend in the alley before it dead-ended they still hadn't heard any sounds that seemed like a struggle or the sounds of a hurt mammal.

Fangmeyer cleared the last corner and gagged at the sight that greeted her. At one paw she was glad that it hadn't been what she had feared what it was, but on the other hand, it was still utterly disgusting. Stupid teenagers. "Wolford it's clear, tell dispatch that we have a terror scare."

Wolford groaned as he holstered his shockgun. Harris just was totally confused about what was happening. "Sorry, but what is going on?"

The wolf looked him over and shrugged his shoulders. "Terror scare. During the Nighthowler scare, that our lovely former mayor orchestrated, prey was pretty vicious towards the pred population. After the plot had gotten exposed, they apologized and tried to make amends. However, some teen preds didn't like that the prey had pushed them around at the time of the scare and even though they got apologies sought to show how badass they were and show off that they could have pushed back."

He pushed Harris gently forward, and as they rounded the corner, the hare had to gag at the sight as he tried not to lose his lunch. What he saw where the cut up remains of several chickens that had started to decompose in the humid air. "Welcome officer Umbra to the onset of a miserable afternoon as this will be our crime scene for the rest of the day. As I was saying, the dumbasses like to pretend that they are all scary and dangerous by buying freshly killed chickens and taking them home. Underway, however, they slice the birds open and start spraying the environment around them with blood to make other mammals, like ourselves just now, believe that an attack had taken place and somebody got hurt. Most of the time you will see this kind of thing happen in prey dense area's of the city to make them think twice about harassing predators."

The hare looked up at the wolf and saw the disgusted expression of his partner as Fangmeyer came up to them. "Here partner use this." She gave him a little jar of something, and as Wolford opened it, Harris had again trouble to breathe again. "Gah! What the hell is that stuff!"

Wolford put a finger in the jar and rubbed the contents directly under his nose. "It's a combination of lots and lots of mint, lemon, and garlic minced up and pulverized to a paste."

"How the hell are you able to smell anything with that stuff on your nose." Harris had to wonder as even the smell from the jar was potent enough that it took his breath away.

At this, the wolf smiled. "I won't." As Umbra narrowed his eyes at his mentor, the wolf sighed. "Please understand the blood is an assault on my smell receptors and I won't be able to identify the perps who did this by the way they smell anyway with all the scents of decay and death al around. We will have to figure this one out by keeping our eyes open and collecting evidence."

"Hey, partner want to give Hopps and Wilde a head up. This crime scene is pretty low-ball, and it would make for a great trainer for our newest members." Fangmeyer smiled at her partner. "This way you and Nick can prevent having your sniffers screwed up as you two can deal with the crowd control and interview of the witnesses. Hopps and I will in the meantime look over our charges while they try to figure this one out."

Wolford had to give it to his partner that as far as crime scenes went this one was a great start for the rookies. Not only would they have to get used to the smell of decay that every officer encountered in their careers, but the stakes were small enough that they could proceed leading the investigation without having to much pressure on them on solving it.

He called his partners suggestion in with dispatch and got a reply a couple of seconds later that the chief had agreed and the other rookie and her mentors would be joining them shortly. Taking one last look at the scene, he locked eyes with his partner and saw her give him a wink before waving him off. He then proceeded towards the way they came to take care of things back at the entrance of the alley.


	8. Chapter 7 - Investigation

**Chapter 7: Investigation.**

Judy Hopps had taken the role of watching over the new officers on their first real case. The call to assist in the investigation had come to them at the end of the afternoon. They had realized that the experience the new blood could accrue with this inquiry was worth the overtime and the chief had okayed it shortly afterward. She had to hand it to Ralph and Nadine. The fact how they had presented it to Bogo had been a huge part of getting both of the rookies on the new investigation. Having them, both join forces to process the scene and try to get leads was not only ideal for their training, but in this way, they could also assess if they would work well as partners or if other pairings would be a better option when the time came for them to be partnered up.

She looked at Nadine who was busy with removing the bird carcasses from the scene. The photographer had finished taking pictures of the whole mess, and the relief that the smell of decay got removed was a blessing as even with her limited range of smell it was almost enough to make her gag.

Judy thought about Nick and the distinct shudder he had given as the smells slowly overwhelmed him. She had been quick to grab the little jar of lotion. Most mammals who partnered with canids made sure to have a pot of the stuff handy as the canids themselves and their do and die attitude would just keep going even as the smell slowly burned their sinuses. It wasn't that the smell of decay impaired their smelling, but Nick had described it as being blasted in the ear by an air horn and having your ears ring for hours afterward. The smell would likewise always be in the background and mess with the other things they perceived. No problem for a regular mammal, but for an officer of the law who would use smell to determine if a suspect had been at a scene by their odor it was critical.

By using the lotion, the officers could 'switch off' their senses as the brain just decided the cream was too foul and turned the smell out. Nick and Wolford could therefore not distinguish smells after using the lotion, but when they washed off the cream, their senses were back up to scratch within an hour, whereas if they didn't, it could take them days to not have to deal with the smell disturbance. Judy found that out the hard way.

The time she had almost found out the problem canids had with the smell of blood and decay had been in a car accident they got directed too. A female deer had not bothered to buckle up and had slammed face first into the front window. Needless to say, blood had been everywhere on the scene and the car and as Nick and Judy had done their best to free the driver from the car assisting the fire department the canid had taken many breaths full of the scent before they could lift her out.

Nobody had told her the consequences for a canid and Nick had gone his way at the end of their shift, and she had been none the wiser. The memory of the next few days stung as she remembered that Nick had seemed fine. He acted as always, and he never gave anything away. Although she noticed Nick seemed more tired than normal though, but the fox had assured her that his neighbors had gotten into some arguments and the fox hadn't gotten enough sleep; as a result, the last few days. There hadn't been anything to indicate that he had been lying and she had let it slide as Nick seemed to be okay otherwise.

The second time had been a couple of weeks after they had gotten together. They had received the call that a mammal had tried to burn down a house that was owned by an interspecies couple. Nick and Judy had always tried to keep things professional to not let animals get to them like Nick's mantra always said, but with the interspecies aspect of the hate, it had been hard. Harder had it been to arrive at the scene and see what remained of a cougar who had tried to Molotov the house in question but had probably mishandled the bottle it seemed. He had caught on fire and during the madness that followed as he had tried to put the fire out had managed to cut himself. Again blood had been everywhere, and with the added smell of burned flesh, it had been the scene from hell to process. At that time Ralph and Nadine had arrived too, and Hopps had looked on confused as Fangmeyer handed Wolford a little jar of lotion to smear beneath his nose.

She had asked Fangmeyer about it, and Nadine had tried to explain the consequenced for not spreading the cream, but Judy had not seen Nick been affected in the way that Nadine had told her. It hadn't been till they were asleep that evening that Judy learned the full truth. Nick had woken startled from a nightmare he had and with the scent of blood in his nose, he had gone into a full blown panic mode. First, the fox had checked himself for injuries and not finding any got extremely panicky. He had frantically checked Judy for any wounds asking where she had gotten hurt, but before she could have even answered, he had lifted her up and was carrying her towards the front door planning to go to the hospital.

It had taken Judy ten minutes at least before Nick would listen and even longer before he had calmed down enough from waking up in that manner and he accepted that it all just had been a nightmare and in reality, she was not hurt and didn't need a hospital. He had refused to let her go though and sitting down on the couch the couple had taken a while cuddling. Judy had sat on his lap and listened to his heart softly slowing down to normal levels. After they had moved back into the bedroom, she had made sure to put Nick back to bed and had called Nadine right after.

It was also through that that she learned that Wolford and Fangmeyer had been a couple in secret as it was Ralph that had answered Nadine's phone. He had still been fast asleep at the time and hadn't noticed who was calling. Luckily Nadine had expected the call and told Judy what she needed to do to ease the problems Nick had. Later she taught Judy a recipe of a version of the lotion that performed better than the store bought version and it was that one she always kept on her to help Ralph and Judy made sure to always have a little jar in her gear for occasions just like this.

Nick hated to smear the stuff though (most canids did), but he always used it whenever she handed the jar over. Still, Judy felt better now that after they had smeared the lotion, Nick and Ralph had left the site to them and had gone to interview the bar owner and walk through the neighborhood to see if they could scrounge up some witnesses.

Nadine had finished rounding up the chicken carcasses and deposited them all in evidence coolers to have them examined in a lab. At first glance, the scene indicated that this was another pred stunt, but something was off with the marks on the bodies and it always paid to make sure. Fangmeyer handed the coolers over to one of the techs, which were standing by, and as he left to start the examinations back in the lab turned her attention back to the scene.

Soniko and Harris had been busy all afternoon taking photo's themselves, analyzing the blood amount and spatter to determine how and when the chickens were cut up and went through all the bins to see if there was any evidence thrown away by the perps.

Even as Soniko was doing the math in her head, it just didn't add up. The amount of blood on the walls and floor was not consistent with chickens who had their head cut off and bled out some at the butchers. The only conclusion she could reach from this fact was that the chickens had been alive when they were brought here and killed. Even then if they had just cut the head off it wouldn't have resulted in the gruesome scene they found themselves in, and she realized she needed the lab results to deduce what had happened here.

Harris was in the meantime swapping all the bloodstains. He was sure it would all come back as chicken blood, but in this case, the amount of blood was so much that it wasn't out of the realm of possibilities that someone had used the chickens to camouflage a murder scene. The hare looked at the dozens of swabs they had already taken, and Harris realized he would be swabbing a lot more before they had a swab of every bloodstain in the place. As the hare looked for the next place to scrub his eyes passed a metal cage. It looked out of place sitting next to a garbage container and as he approached it was hard not to notice some white feathers sticking to the metal.

Assumptions were always discouraged by the police force as they could steer an investigator from reaching the right conclusion. The feathers on the cage, however, didn't need the help of the great mouse detective to figure out. It had most undoubtedly been used to transport the chickens, but what was disturbing, however, was that this was not the way to carry dead birds for supper. He quickly grabbed a large evidence bag and with the help of Hopps who he called over for assistance placed the cage inside. It would be up to the lab to figure out if the feathers were indeed as he thought chicken feathers or that another type of fowl had been transported that way.

* * *

Nick and Ralph in the meantime had spoken to the bar owner, and as he told it, he had just thrown away some leftovers in the garbage container behind his restaurant when he heard what sounded like an argument further down the alley. The argument got louder and louder. Then the owner suddenly heard what sounded like a scuffle during which someone said he was getting blood al over him. At that, the owner took it as someone had gotten stabbed and following that idea he believed he had stumbled upon a mugging in process. Coming to that conclusion the bar owner had done the only thing he could think off and immediately called the police. He hadn't dared to take another look though so he hadn't seen who had come from the alley as the owner feared reprisal if he had.

Nick had asked about how the mammals had sounded, and the owner had said that they didn't sound drunk and their voices had been average. There hadn't been a hint of the argument when he got out of the bar to throw away the trash which could mean the altercation started there. Nick nodded as the fox wrote it all down and Ralph took another look at the alley. The wolf remembered the crowd that had formed around the entrance to it caused by the ruckus, and he started to frown. How did the perpetrators get away? The alley curved three times before ending in a dead-end so the ones that did mess up the walls would have had to come out this way. But as the owner told it at least one of them would have been covered in blood so they couldn't have slipped by unseen.

Suddenly it hit him that the alley had many back doors leading to it. If they had access to one of them, getting out of the scene would have been easy, but it would also mean that one of them would have the key. Which would mean... He quickly grabbed Nick and told him his theory and the fox agreed immediately. They couldn't have left any other way. Even better seeing as there had been no calls over bloody mammals running around it would seem that they had avoided beeing seen altogether which would mean they had cleaned themselves up and to do that they needed access to one of the apartments. It would seem that at least one of their suspects lived in one of the buildings.

This fact narrowed it down quite a bit from the whole city to one or two apartment building. And seeing as the pred population wasn't large in this part of town, they would only have to interview a couple of residents before they would get lucky.

Wolford was quick to inform dispatch of his deduction and asked for the addresses of any pred inhabitants in the buildings surrounding the alley.

Nick had to smile to himself as this was turning out to be an easier case than he even thought. When the call had come it, he couldn't believe that such an unusual case had presented itself to them. Seeing as not one of the old cases had gone unsolved he thought that it would be clear to anyone what the inevitable outcome would be if they tried it again. But teenagers would be teenagers, and sadly this bunch wasn't alto bright to not realizing they shouldn't have done it in their backyard.

* * *

Soniko finished bagging the last of the evidence and got ready to head over to the lab to start sorting through it. As she stood up to leave her phone started ringing. She answered it immediately. "Hello, Cindy Soniko speaking."

"Cindy, it's mom where are you? Your shift ended two hours ago." Cindy shut her eyes and scolded herself for forgetting to call home to tell them she was going to be late. "Sorry mom we got a call at the end of our shift, and I'm currently working a case."

"A case? It's your second day isn't it too early for you to be working cases?" Her mother sounded dumbfounded, and Cindy had to admit that it was a stroke of luck to be handed even a small case on her second day. It had taken Hopps nearly a month on the beat (not counting the Nighthowler case) before she had gotten the chance to take the lead on an investigation. "Mom calm down the situation isn't high profile, but it's a great starter for me to learn some fieldwork."

Her mom sighed. "Fine how much longer will you be out dear?" Soniko had to think about that. The lab could easily be another hour or two. Quickly doing the math in her head, the panda realized she wouldn't be home to see her family before they went to bed and informed her mother that she would be late and that she could go to sleep.

She disconnected and saw how Harris handed over the evidence bags he had collected to the lab tech. Hopps and Fangmeyer were looking at some of the blood spatter. Soniko headed over. "Found anything guys?"

Judy looked up and gave Cindy a smile. "Soniko perfect timing! Look at this blood spatter does it tell you anything?"

Cindy frowned she was sure that this was a test but didn't see the use of knowing what this particular blood spatter would reveal. She kneeled down and took a good look at it. Judy got down to her level and let her work it out as Nadine grabbed Harris and pulled him gently over, so he didn't miss the lesson they wanted to impart to them.

Soniko in the meantime couldn't see any meaning in the blood spatter. They already knew the blood came from cut up chickens there was no mystery there and she told this to Judy who just smirked at that. "It's not what's there that has Fangmeyer and me so interested; it's what missing!"

Harris leaned in. "How do you mean what's missing all there is is a lot of blood."

Nadine butted in at that. "Yep, there is a lot of blood over there. And a lot of blood over there. And and a lot of blood over there. But over here is..."

Harris and Soniko took another look at the place where Fangmeyer was pointing, and while there was blood there, it was far far less than everywhere else. "You mean they started spraying blood everywhere and then removed something before they continued? Why?"

"Good question! I wish I had a real answer to go with it!" Fangmeyer was frustrated at the lack of a good explanation about why someone would feel the need to remove something while covering everything with blood during the event. And why bother at all if it had already got dirty anyway?

She looked at Judy and saw the irritation in her eyes as well. They both knew this was important, but they would need a lot more info before they could figure this out. Fangmeyer took another photo of the mismatch in blood volume and the officers headed towards their patrol cars where Nick and Ralph were waiting on them. As they approached, they saw that the pair were also frustrated.

"What's up slick? Didn't anyone see anything?" Nick and Wolford proceeded to fill them in about what the bar owner had told them and the theories they had that the criminals couldn't have slipped away and had to be hiding in the apartment building.

"Good job Nick! We just have to interview the few preds that live there, and we'll have our suspect." Judy was pleased with the pairs deductive skills. She felt sorry for the rookies though as the case was solved just as they started it, but even if the case got closed there was still the evidence to sort through to build the case further for the DA that would be handling it.

"There is a problem fluff we already asked for the addresses of all the predators." Nick was not his relaxed self, and Judy had to wonder what was bothering him as Nick never let anything get to him. "Then what's the problem?"

Ralph sighed and gave the bunny the list. There was only one address on it. "We already visited the address, and it's owned by a lovely elderly panther couple without children of their own." Nadine frowned and suddenly looked up alarmed as she realized just what the implications were as Ralph continued. "Whoever our suspects are the chances are very high that they are prey."

* * *

 **Writers note:**

 **The first names of Wolford and Fangmeyer I borrowed with permission from 'Minsclovesboo'. If you haven't read 'Love's tales' yet I can highly recommend it for the funny writing and the great Wildehopps and Wolfeyer shipping.  
**


	9. Chapter 8 - What next?

**Chapter 8: What next?**

Chief Bogo was not having a good day. And that was a shame, as it started out heavenly. His wife made his favorite breakfast, the commute was short and sweet with no holdups, and even though two of his officers had brought up a problem, that they seemed to feel needed his attention early in the morning, they had accepted his ruling without question. The rookies also hadn't made a fuss when they were assigned differently than they had expected. It had been quiet all through the morning, and while the scare with the kit was calling in with the choking mom around noon, his officers dealt with it with the professionalism that he expected from them. All had worked together perfectly, and the mother and child got rescued.

He learned that the mom had left the hospital later in the day and would not suffer any adverse effects due to her choking on candy. The real trouble had started with the call late in the afternoon. The report about 'the mugging' was a dark blot on an entirely good day, but he expected that his officers would handle it satisfactory as well. However when the reports came in about the blood speckled walls and the request for backup arrived Bogo knew his day just had gone down the crapper.

Luckily it seemed like just a horrible misplaced teen stunt. He darkly remembered the time directly after the Nighthowler scheme had been revealed and thought back about the teens that had been brought in for each of the scares. How righteous they were about the fact that they were in the right to pull those stunts. Their parent's, however, hadn't seen it their way though and it relaxed Bogo considerably that at least the discipline they would face was up to the punishments he would have enacted himself.

The chief looked up from his reports and looked at the six officers that were standing in front of his desk. The rookies were looking ill at ease, and Bogo could understand their feelings. With the bad news they had just brought before them, they probably were fearing that it would be them feeling the brunt of his ire.

And the news was bad. This incident had gone way WAY beyond what a 'terror scare' would entail. The chickens examined in the lab had all been cut up with sharp daggers. It was however as the officers feared and the chickens were alive when they got cut up. With the details about the cuts and draining of blood, the killings were too gruesome to imagine. This fact of cruelty to avians was high profile enough that the press had learned about it before he had even gotten the reports and the news was reporting about it since.

Luckily it was late in the evening when the info got out, so in that regards he still had some time till the city proper would learn of it, but he needed to get a handle on this and fast. Not only could it appear that predators had gone off the deep end as this seemed to be a stunt gone wrong. But with the possibility brought before him by his officers that it might have been prey trying to get preds into trouble, it could be enough to reignite old conflicts and bring everyone back to the state the city was in during the Nighthowler scare if the press would learn of it.

Bogo needed results, and he needed them now. Still, his officers were dead tired, and he needed them back at the top of their game if they wanted any chance to head this off before it became bigger than it needed too. "I've read your reports, and combined with the reports from the lab I don't have to tell you it is bad." The officers straightened up some more, and even Wilde was looking grim. If there ever was an indication that this situation had gone to fertilizer, it was visible on the fox's face.

"For now I want you six to go home and get some sleep. Tomorrow you will head to the scene directly don't bother coming in. Wilde, Wolford you two will interview every resident in that block, call in everyone who acts suspiciously and I'll assign officers to look into them. Fangmeyer, Umbra you two will head straight to the alley and go through it another time. Turn over the garbage bins, sweep up and bring in the dust if it will lead to a suspect. If there is still evidence there to find, I want it in our possession. Hopps, Soniko you both need to go to the lab and process all the evidence a second time. The chances are slim, but maybe the lab boys missed something. Also while you're there, try to figure out what got taken away from the scene while all this savagery was happening. It might not be related to the act itself, but it may lead to witnesses." The chief looked his officers over. Their faces were grim but determined to close this case no matter what. "We've dealt with this kind of crime before, and the savagery of the act now doesn't change anything about the fact that we are gonna do our investigation quick, efficiently and that we'll bring the suspects in before this gets out of hand. I have the greatest faith in you six that you'll handle this investigation to the high standards that the city demands from you."

The six officers salutes and all spoke as one. "Yes, sir!" Bogo nodded his head. It was an unfortunate situation to be sure, but at least he had some of his best officers on it, and with the help of the rookies, they would at the very least have a new perspective on the evidence. "Good to hear it. Now dismissed!" The officers all turned and left the office in an orderly manner. As the door closed, the chief shut his eyes rubbing them. The feelings of exhaustion were overtaking him, and he still needed to inform the mayor of what had happened as well as make sure the night patrols were in a heightened state of preparedness. If pred vs. prey violence erupted again, the police would be prepared to handle it at least.

* * *

The drive back to the hotel was tedious. It had taken far too long to get everything set up for the weekend, and the dark figure still had to figure out how to film the event without anyone noticing. At least there would be a couple of days to figure it out before the fun began. A tired smile adorned his muzzle as the mammal thought about everything that had happened. Getting his property back had been a fun example of payback done right. They had dared to steal from him, and when he had tracked them down, as they couldn't hide their scent to save their lives, they had thought that blackmailing him would be a good idea.

Their first order had been for him to get them some chickens and he was extremely sure they had meant the butchered kind. He had to chuckle to himself that they must have thought that they could have used him for their schemes. The gall of it all. If the police didn't catch them before he would put his plans in motion, it might be prudent to give them a visit to introduce them with the contents of the container.

His smile grew at the thought that he indeed hadn't gotten subjects for phase two of the tests. Sadly the contents hadn't matured enough to affect adult mammals yet. Still, he knew where these 'children of Bellwether' lived. When he was ready, he could round them up, and if they were in police custody, well, there never seemed to be a shortage of homeless mammals.

Bellwether. She would have been a worthy adversary if he ever had given any crap about pred rights. The way she had magistrated the Nighthowlers incident had been a work of pure genius, and it had only been because she had gotten overconfident that she had been brought down by the mammals that had been levitated by legislation she had pushed to implement. Maybe he would visit her and inform her what kind of creatures used her name for their movement. Would she be happy to hear that others were continuing her righteous cause or would she be disgusted like he was what kind of dregs were using her name in vain?

Ah, at least these so called 'children' had been given a good lesson in aggression. They had protested that the chickens had been alive. Well, they hadn't opposed anymore when he had opened the cage and ripped a chicken apart in front of them. Oh, the blood had gone everywhere and those faces of theirs as they realized what was happening. He was laughing now as the memory of their horrified expressions. Oh if there was a hell they must have thought that he had come from it. He had done in another chicken in the same manner before threatening them that they were next if they didn't slaughter the rest in the same fashion themselves.

The daggers he had provided them looked wrong in their paws. It was a great loss to throw away some of his cherished tools, but seeing as they forever were tainted by the garbage that was using them, he would never have used them again anyway. As the chickens ran all over the place followed close behind by the desperate 'children' he had grabbed his container and escaped before mammals would show up to find out what the ruckus was all about.

He wondered if they had escaped back to their apartment when they figured out he was gone. If so it would be easy for the police to find them. It would only take one resident of the apartment building walking through the corridors, and the jig would be up. He had made damn sure they got covered in as much blood as he could squirt from the chickens remains. Hell, he had been so mad at the time it had been close, or a lot more blood would have spilled and no chicken blood at that. Suddenly he noticed the death grip he had on the wheel of the car and relaxed. "Just take a deep breath and relax. You have dealt with the trash, and the experiment is prepared and ready to go."

It had taken weeks of legwork to find a subject that was young enough to give his creation a chance on affecting him or her. Ah so young, so innocent, SO INCLINED TO EAT PLANTS. The dark figure had seen the child a couple of times, always visiting the park on the weekends and always getting a scolding from her dear lovely mommy about the fact that she shouldn't eat the flowers in the park. It was so endearing to see her drop her ears and apologized. Then repeat it next weekend. If his expectations about this possible subject were correct, it would probably happen at the start of next week.

Still, three more days of boredom before the fun started. Well, in the meantime, he could set up some covert cameras to capture the glorious moment the dark figures newest creation got its debut in Zootopia. Hopefully, Mommy still had some more kits back home as his lovely test subject wouldn't be functioning afterward if the trial was a success.

Laughing loudly, he turned his car onto the highway and floored the gas.

* * *

Judy and Nick cuddled on their bed. It had been late, and they hadn't wasted any time getting ready to sleep, but with the memories of the scene fresh in their minds rest hadn't been forthcoming.

"Nick, how are you feeling?" Judy looked up into her boyfriend's eyes as she worriedly stroked his face and muzzle. Nick hadn't been on the scene long before she had made sure he was far away from it, but she wasn't going to risk him having to deal with the nightmares ever again.

Nick softly smiled and pulled Judy close into a gentle hug. "Don't worry fluff I didn't get much scent of the blood in my nose, and your ointment did the trick of shutting down my smell receptors. I'm more worried about you."

The doe stiffened shortly about being found out before she hugged her fox back. It had been hard to be surrounded by blood, but it had been necessary to get the evidence to close this case. "I'm okay Nick it will take a while before the images of all that blood do not come back to me, but I'll handle it."

Nick looked sadly at his girlfriend and softly pulled her to him as he softly started kissing her. The kiss was soft and sweet, and both of them didn't pull back till they ran out of breath. Panting softly, Nick started unbuttoning Judy's pajama top while softly kissing her again. Judy broke the kiss and gave her beautiful fox a confused smile. "Nick am I going to win our bet, honey?" She softly caressed his face indicating her willingness to take things further.

The fox gave her a gentle smile. "Not at all my lovely carrots, but I'm calling a timeout on our bet as I think we both can do with some physical, emotional attention. And there was never anything in the rules that forbade some heavy petting if I'm not mistaken." At that, the fox softly leaned down and nibbled on Judy's neck before making his way down her chest.

The bunny's breathing started to pick up as the feelings her boyfriend was awakening within her began to burn hot. "Hmmm. You are right about there being nothing in the rules, but don't think that I'll forget that you're practically cheating with heating up our arrangement to unbearable levels!" She grabbed his head and pulling him back up to her kissed him hard. They deepened the kiss as their tongues met and their paws started to move all over each other.

Nick took off her pajama top not breaking the kiss and threw it to the side. As he softly leaned over Judy, he felt how hard his heart was beating and felt himself shake with the nervousness and excitement over the fact that they were going to be taking things one step further. As the fox looked down at his lover, Nick saw how Judy looked up at him with a love that made the fox forget everything around him. He also noticed that she was shaking a little too, but just as he wanted to ask if she was alright, she reached up and softly pulled him down to her as she softly wrapped her legs around him.

As the night progressed, the rain started to fall. It was the beautiful kind that washed away the memories of the day and sounded like a lovely background music to the sounds of lovemaking coming from the apartment.

A while later they both lay panting in each other's embrace while they came down from the peaks their emotions had taken them. Judy still had her eyes closed as she relished in the feelings of the afterglow. She was hugging Nick's head to her chest while softly stroking his ears.

As the fox slowly lifted himself off her, they looked into each other's eyes and kissed with as much love as they could give. Then snuggled close al the while softly caressing each other's backs, arms, and ears.

Nick was the first to speak. "We'll definitely have to put this in our weekly routine."

Judy giggled at that and softly flicked on of his ears. "What you haven't had enough?"

The fox gave her a loving smile. "I'll never have enough of you Judy." And with that, he kissed her with as much passion as he could muster.

Now it would have been a great end if they could have said that they fell asleep in each other's arms as was so often depicted in romantic books and movies. But the desperate need to pee and clean themselves up had them up and out of bed within the hour. The pajama bottoms they had been wearing during their lovemaking had been soiled as well and were in desperate need of a wash.

After they had cleaned and relieved themselves, they laid back down and kissing each other before saying their 'good nights' settled in for the evening.

* * *

Cindy had gotten up to get a glass of water from the kitchen. Sleep, as it had for her mentors, had eluded her, and she hoped that getting something to drink would help. The images of blood kept repeating themselves and sparked the memories of that evening in her youth.

Her father was lying in front of her in terrible pain. He tried to keep a strong face for her, but she saw the silent tears that fell from his eyes as the pain rocked through him. She looked around desperately and screamed for help.

She hadn't forgotten the promise. If she ever were in trouble, he would come for her. And with her dad hurting as he was, there was no better time for him to show up. But when the couple arrived much later and called the police she realized that even though he promised he wouldn't come to her rescue. It had hurt, and even though she had grown up and realized that the promise had been a vain kid hope, to begin with, she couldn't find it in herself to forgive him for breaking it.

"Cindy everything alright?" The soft question asked by her mother brought her back to the present, and she put the glass in the sink before turning to her mother. She looked worried as she came over. "Honey you look terrible. What's wrong?"

"Sorry, mom can't talk about it." Soniko stretched and got a jolt when her mother grabbed her and pulled her into a tight hug. "I know you can't talk about police work outside the precinct, but if you ever need to speak about anything that's not related to that, please remember that I'm here for you."

Cindy hugged her mom back and relished the close contact that she realized she had been missing after the case. "Thanks, mom, for everything. I'm sorry I forgot to call home I would be late."

Soniko's mom softly kissed her on the cheek. "Don't worry about it, honey. I understand that it can be difficult to call home when being out on assignment, but you have to realize that I'll always worry till you're back home."

The red panda kissed her mother back and gave her a last tight hug before releasing her. "I know mom, but I'm a grown mammal now."

Her mother laughed. "Grown up you might be, but don't think that you ever will be anything else than my little girl to me."

Soniko felt warmed by those words and kissed her mother goodnight before going back to bed. She looked at one of the pictures she had hanging on her wall. It was an old one from the elementary school she had attended before the move. She looked at herself all happy and bright-eyed not realizing the horror she would be subjected to just a year from that day. Next to her was her best friend his ruby red eyes sparkling as he looked happy at the camera. She softly let her fingers slide over his face as tears softly fell from her eyes. "Why didn't you come to save me?"


	10. Chapter 9 - A plot most foul

**Author's note: First thing first. I have to apologize to everyone about the last chapter. The scene with Nick and Judy deserved better and me being upset that I couldn't deliver it as I wanted without turning the rating to M made sure I did a subpar job in mine opinion. Reading over it a dozen times I could see the crummy job done and I went back to rewrite parts of that scene. It now at least is up to par with the level of writing I'm able to deliver (please bear in mind that these are the first stories I'm writing and thus am still learning). I hope that my addition adds to your enjoyment of the overall storyline. Also this chapter seemed easier to write than the ones before it so I decided that after the final edits and corrections were done I would post it instead of waiting for the weekend. Hope that you'll enjoy this one and please inform me about how you think the story is progressing.  
**

* * *

 **Chapter 9: A plot most foul.**

As the new day began Wolford and Fangmeyer had picked up Harris and Nick in their cruiser to begin their investigation anew at the crime scene. Judy in the meantime had taken Soniko in the patrol car she and Nick shared, and they were headed towards the lab to sift through the evidence in the vain hope of uncovering any new facts to investigate.

Chief Bogo had a stressful morning as the press smelled intrigued and was determined to get all the facts and dirt from him. The chief had managed to keep the press at bay and made sure to keep repeating again and again that the evidence was at the moment inconclusive and investigations were still ongoing. With no fuel to keep it burning the press were forced to relent, but Bogo knew that this hard-won time he had managed to acquire for his officers to finish their investigation was not going to last long. If they didn't find what was needed to close this case as soon as possible, the press would start trying to piece together what had happened and what they would come up with would not be good for the city.

As Bogo sat down at his desk with a heavy sigh another mammal across the city was having his own troubles.

* * *

Westley Dambildir, a beaver that was a second-year student, was having serious doubts about staying silent with what had happened yesterday. Yeah, it had all started out with them trying to make some trouble for the gang of predators that hung out in the alley behind their apartment building, but Jeremy had to go and make things worse. First by being a total dumbass stealing the metal case from some pred that had been busy dealing with some market merchant and that would have been bad enough by itself if he hadn't been so batpoop crazy to bring the thing right back to them forgetting preds and their keen sense of smell.

Oh yeah, when the guy showed up Westley had been close to soiling himself. Whatever the guy was up to the beaver was sure it was bad. There hadn't been any emotions on his face, and even more, worrying was the hint of a smile that didn't go away when the dumbass in their group tried to make him their errant boy. Oh, he seemed to comply easy enough, but when he came back it was clear that they had screwed up in the worst way. What he had done with those live chickens before handing them daggers to repeat it themselves would give him nightmares for years to come he just knew it would.

Westley looked out his window and noticed the squad car pulling up to the curve. As four officers got out, he noticed they were the same ones that had investigated the day before and while it had rained in the evening washing away the evidence the student wasn't sure that he would not be indicated. His nerves finally caving he ran to his phone and dialed the number he was told to dial in an emergency.

"Improbus residence how may I direct your call?" It was clearly some sort of butler on the phone, but Westley didn't have the time to wonder about that. "Can you please tell Max that Westley is calling?"

As the butler confirmed that he would inform his friend the beaver sat down shaking from the nerves he was experiencing.

"Westley my man how is it going?" The happy tone on the other side of the line was making the beaver ill at ease as he could imagine the police already making their way to his apartment to arrest him. "How is it going? It's going to crap over here that's what's going on!"

Max was silent for a moment before continuing. "What's wrong buddy? I know that things didn't go as planned yesterday, but that's no reason to lose your cool like that."

Westley looked at the receiver like it had caught on fire and suppressed an urge to ram it against the wall a couple of times. "Not as planned? We were covered in blood! The police are all over my building, and you know they won't stop till they have found the culprits. It won't surprise me if they haven't found a witness already that hung all our asses out to dry!"

There was a loud sigh on the other side of the line, and Max started talking again with an admonishing voice. "Calm down. First off there are no witnesses we made sure to check before we went to your apartment. Second, the police can't track our smell as the blood will severely mess with their noses. Third, you don't realize it, but the fact that the police is there is a blessing in disguise. Are there any preds among them?

Westley had to think about the officers he saw exiting the patrol car. "There was a fox, a tiger and a wolf among them." As he said that he heard a yell of joy. "Perfect. Tell you what you hang back there, and I will send someone over to help you. When this is all over even the preds in the police department will be under heavy scrutiny, and we will have the perfect opportunity to get rid of some of them."

The beaver had to suppress a sob as he shook harder when Westley realized he would be required to mess with the police next and the beaver was sure that Max wouldn't be sticking his neck out for him if he was taken down. "Max, you're confident that I'm not gonna get in trouble for this are you?"

"Don't worry my comrade. The one I'm gonna send over will take good care of you, and I promise you with all my heart that you will have no problem with the police whatsoever."

"I mean it Max if I go down for this I'm taking you with me!" Westley wasn't sure that threats would work at this junction, but he had to make sure his 'friend' understood the implications if he was setting him up. When Max spoke next, the warmth had gone from his voice, and the beaver wondered if he had made a mistake. "Now there is no reason for you to make idle threats like that! Just make sure to follow the guy's instructions when he gets there, and things will get sorted out. Now till he gets there, I would appreciate it if you didn't call me again." With that, the call was disconnected, and Westley released the breath he didn't realize he was holding. As he put the phone back on the receiver, he heard the doorbell and knew without a doubt who he would find on the other end of his front door.

* * *

Nick and Ralph had been steadily going from door to door to interview the residents of the apartment building, and up till now, there hadn't been anyone that had even come remotely close to suspicious. They had only two floors left in this building, and then they had to rethink their position. The other two buildings were not like they though accessible from the alley leaving only this building as a possible place for their culprits to exit the scene from and wash up in.

Just as they were about to ring the bell again, the door was answered by a male beaver in his teens wearing a college hoody from Zootopia University. As Ralph looked the teen over Nick started the conversation. "Good day sir. I'm officer Wilde this is my colleague officer Wolford. We came to ask if you noticed anything strange yesterday?" Ralph saw the tremble as the beaver was clearly ill at ease and by the way, Nick's facial features cemented into a mask of pleasantness the wolf was sure he had noticed it too.

"No officer I haven't noticed anything off. Any reason why you are asking?" The beaver was looking from Ralph to Nick and back again, and the fox was sure that if the beaver didn't have anything to do with their case he would eat his badge. Hell, he would eat Judy's badge too, and that would be a challenge as the rabbit would fight him to save it.

"You didn't hear anything strange or see any suspicious movement in the hallway?" Nick made sure to keep smiling and try to get the beaver to slip up, but the mammal was too nervous and dodgy. "No officer like I said I haven't noticed anything wrong. Now can I go I was in the middle of something when you rang the doorbell."

"No problem sir. Here is my phone number at the precinct so if you remember anything to make sure to call me." At this, Nick handed out one of his cards the officers kept on them to deliver to witnesses and victims to give them the means to contact them.

"Thank you, officer, if I remember anything I will." With this, the beaver quickly closed the door, and Nick and Ralph made sure not to give anything away as they casually walked down the hallway.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" Nick asked as he looked over his shoulder making sure the beaver wasn't watching them depart.

"You mean that the way that guy was acting he is not able to be innocent of ANYTHING." Wolford nodded. He liked Nick, as far as police officers went he and Hopps were great to hang out and investigate with. When it came to deductions, they were about the same level as Nadine and him.

Nick keyed in his radio and informed dispatch of the possible suspect and requested a pair of officers to be assigned surveillance on him like Bogo had requested. "You think it's still necessary to interview the rest of the building?"

Ralph shrugged. "It's clear as day that we have found one of our suspects. Still, it couldn't hurt to see if we can't see if the rest of the gang was also living here."

Nick nodded. "Good point buddy, in this case, it pays to be thorough. I hope that Nadine and Judy have found some leads too."

* * *

Judy and Cindy weren't having much luck in the meantime. They had reported to the lab, and while the three technicians there had been pleasant enough it was evident, they were a little bit irritated that their work was going to be double checked by others. Still, everyone was professional, and even the best could make a mistake, so there hadn't been any problems.

As Judy took another chicken carcass from the fridge to see what kind of weapon had been used on it, she noticed that Cindy was looking very tired. She decided to see if it had anything to do with the scene yesterday and asked in a friendly manner. "Hey had trouble sleeping?"

Soniko looked up from her own carcass and gave Judy a shrug. "Yeah, you can say that. Had some stuff to think about and before I noticed it, it was morning."

Judy nodded misunderstanding the situation. "I understand. All that blood yesterday wasn't healthy for my night's rest either." She noticed then the confused look Cindy was giving her. "Or was there something else bothering you?"

Cindy cursed herself for her slip up as the thoughts she had about Joe weren't ones she was willing to discuss. "Just thinking about events of the past. Don't worry it won't hinder my ability to perform my duties."

The rabbit looked her partner for the day over and sighed. "It isn't about you being able to carry out our obligations or not. I'm worried that there is something that is making you lose sleep. Now I know we just met, and I can understand that would make it hard to confide in me, but I want you to know that if you ever need an ear to listen to mine will be available to you."

The red panda looked down deep in thought. Cindy didn't want to discuss Joe with Judy. She was friendly enough, but as she said they had just met, and Cindy didn't know her sufficient for that. Still, it couldn't hurt to get some perspective from someone else on the old pain she was feeling. "Can I ask you a question?"

Judy perked up and gave her an encouraging smile. "Sure. I don't know if I know the answer you seek, but feel free to ask."

"If someone broke a promise with you and hurt you in the process, but they don't know that they hurt you. Is it fair to be angry at that person?" Cindy knew she was unfair, but she couldn't find it in herself to forgive Joe. Yes, it was a childhood promise and as little kids you believe you can do anything even if it turns out to be untrue, but the promise had been important to her.

"Did this person know he was breaking his promise when he did it?" Cindy looked up in shock as Judy looked at her seriously. The red panda knew that he couldn't have known that she was in trouble and he probably never found out that something had happened. "No, I don't think he was ever aware of it."

"Then I would confront him about it. If he doesn't know he did anything wrong, you can't expect him to understand that you're angry with him." Judy made sure that she had Soniko's full attention. "When he knows what he did wrong you can go into how he hurt you with breaking the promise and that gives him the chance to apologize for it."

Cindy suddenly felt like a little kit again. "What if he isn't sorry for breaking it?" She felt a paw on her shoulder and looking up saw that Judy had moved over giving her shoulder a friendly squeeze. "I don't think you believe he wouldn't regret hurting you. If you really felt he didn't care you wouldn't be so conflicted about it."

With that Soniko closed her eyes and just gave a nod of understanding. She now understood what she had to do. Still doing it would be hard as she had to confront Joe. If everything had gone like normal at the academy, she just could have walked up to him and asked for them to talk, but with the drugs being found in his locker and her panicked mistake afterward she might have screwed up things between them to much.

If she wanted to rebuild her friendship with him, she would need to find out what had happened at the academy while in the meantime trying to keep the attention away from him. She had made a mistake because she didn't have the time to think things over, but now she would make sure to find out if he had been doing drugs and if Joe had been innocent, as he had claimed, to locate the evidence needed to clear his name.

* * *

Westley was pacing back and forth in his apartment waiting for the mammal Max had to send his way and wondering how much longer it would be before the police would leave and they missed their chance. As the doorbell rang again, he bolted towards the door and opened it up to be greeted by another police uniform.

"Sorry officer I already told your colleague that I didn't see anything!" As Westley said that he looked up and saw the eyes of the mammal he had been talking too. Suddenly he knew exactly what Max had planned to get the police in trouble, and he also knew that he hadn't lain too. There would be no way he would be in trouble with the police. As the mammal in the uniform pushed his way into the apartment, his last thought went to his parents. 'Mom, dad, sorry I wasn't a better son.'

* * *

Nadine and Harris had been busy looking through the alley any new leads, but the rain the night before had washed away a lot of the blood and the garbage cans didn't give them any new clues either.

"We drew the short end of the stick didn't we?" Harris had to wonder what the point was of coming back here. They had gone over the scene with a fine comb, so it was very doubtful there would be anything left for them to find.

Nadine sniggered as she realized that the new blood was correct in his assessment of their situation. "Very much yeah. Still, you never know. For all, we are aware the suspects returned to the scene of the crime and left new evidence for us to recover."

The hare shook his head in exasperation. "Yeah, right we just open a garbage bin and presto we find new evidence just like that eh?"

The tiger smiled at him. "Well, at least we have checked all the bins and containers in this alley so we can be sure they haven't come back here." As she opened the last container, Nadine was sure that she wouldn't find anything of worth but frowned when she noticed that there was more garbage in it than the day before. The trash bins and containers had been emptied recently, so they had been almost empty when they had conducted their search yesterday. Today, however, this container was close to half full.

She gave a quick whistle and motioned the hare to come over to her. "Maybe we got lucky. I'll give you a boost so you can reach the bags."

Harris gave Nadine a doubtful expression. "You're taller than me why don't you just get the bags out yourself. It seems to me you can easily reach them."

Fangmeyer gave him the sad kitty stare she had perfected while dating Ralph and it pleased her to no ends that the hare didn't seem to be impervious to it either. "Fine boost me up I'll get them."

It took a couple of minutes for her and Harris to get all the bags that she thought were suspicious, but when they were done the first thing she noticed was one bag had cuts in it. As she slowly opened it, she saw the glint of many daggers covered with blood and the first thing that went through her mind was B.I.N.G.O. Bingo! A couple of the other bags gave up some bloodied clothes, and there was even a letter in there addressed to a 'W. Dambildir'. Things started to look up, and Nadine couldn't suppress a happy shout as she turned to the new recruit.

"See Umbra. Going through all the garbage had paid off in a big way. I have to hand it to the chief sometimes you just don't know what will fall into your lap." Afterward, she had to admit that she should have worded that differently. The celestials seemed to have a very sick sense of humor.

At the end of that sentence, a window a couple of floors above her burst in a shower of glass and the soulless remains of a mammal, wearing a Zootopia University hoody, smashed into the cement pavement a couple of feet away from them.


	11. Chapter 10 - Desperate struggle

**Chapter 10: Desperate struggle**

Harris had a hard time getting his head around the fact that he just had been a witness to a murder. As Fangmeyer yelled out to him to cover her, his adrenaline started to surge, and he snapped himself out of his daze. As the two cops ran towards the side door, Nadine blessed the celestials that they had the foresight to keep the door unlocked and opened. This decision was for the event that Nick and Ralph would have gotten in trouble, so the two cops in the alley didn't have to run to the front door to provide assistance.

As Harris covered the door, Nadine opened it, and they quickly scoped out the hallway. "Umbra quickly go to the front door and lock it down! Don't let anyone leave." As the hare immediately left to do as instructed Nadine turned around and yanked the handle from the door barricading it as it couldn't open without it. After making sure the killer couldn't use the emergency exit, she keyed up her radio and called in the murder to dispatch before informing her partner and his companion. "Wolford, Wilde come in we just witness a murder. The killer is still in the building; please head to third-floor apartments on the alley side."

Nick and Ralph hadn't been aware of the murder happening as they were three levels higher, but with the report, their thoughts immediately went to the suspicious mammal they had noticed when they were on the third floor. "Well, I guess we're down one suspect," Ralph muttered irrationally as he realized they lost a very promising lead.

As they reached the stairwell, he raised Fangmeyer. "Fangmeyer we're heading down what is the situation downstairs?"

Fangmeyer shockgun raised was covering the stairwell on the bottom floor. "Currently covering the staircase. Umbra has secured the entrance, and I've jammed the emergency exit." As she spoke, she looked up and saw the face of her partner as he cautiously looked down. They locked eyes for a moment before nodding their thoughts been made clear to each other.

"Understood we'll head to the third floor to investigate." As Nick and Ralph slowly descended the stairs, they made sure to check their corners with shockguns at the ready. As they neared their destination, they noticed the stairwell door to the third floor standing open. Seeing as all doors had an automatic closing system fitted in this building they frowned at each other.

"What do you think? Boobytrap?" Ralph signaled with his eyes at the entryway and the unnatural way the door stayed open. Nick nodded his head in agreement. "Yeah, killer probably knows we're here and left a present."

Ralph swore under his breath. They knew they probably had the killer trapped, but this made it seem that this was the killers intend all along and he was prepared to fight them. "Hang on I've got an idea." As Wilde kept covering the door, Wolford quickly headed down the stairs making sure to inform Fangmayer so she wouldn't shoot him by accident.

Passing his mate, he immediately led to the utility room and got a broom with a long handle. After he had collected what he was looking for, he headed back up again to the third floor. As he arrived, he saw that Wilde was still dutifully covering the door and quickly signed for him to back up upstairs. Ralph wasn't sure what would happen when he opened the door, but he didn't want to get himself, or Nick caught up in it.

Wilde took up a new position where he could jump into cover while still being able to cover the door and Wolford used the broom to open the door further slowly. It didn't take much for them to hear the sound of something falling and while Ralph jumped a couple of steps down to get some distance from the door, Nick lay down on the steps to keep them between him and the door.

There was a high pitched sound of something activating, and the door almost was blown off its hinges as a hot ball of electricity flowed out. "RALPH! Please respond everything alright?" The excited voice of Fangmeyer made Wolford quickly tune in to assure her of his safety.

Nick slowly sat up again not forgoing his vigil as he kept his shockgun trained on the doorway. The door still hung limply from the bottom hinge, and while the fox slowly descended towards the third floor, he noticed a ball lying on the floor. It looked like the remains of a stun grenade, but at a glance at the pieces, it seemed to have modifications that were not part of the original design. He quickly glanced over to his temporary partner and saw Wolford ascend the stairs again. As they prepared to enter the hallway, Wolford informed the rest of the team that they were going ahead with clearing the third floor and asked the description of the murder victim.

Fangmeyer relayed all the info they had learned from the few seconds they had seen the victim before they had run in, but it was more than enough for Nick and Ralph as the clothes matched the beaver that had gotten their interest. Nick sighed. "You were right we just lost our suspect."

"Someone must be cleaning up. Don't know why the killer would want to fight the police though." Ralph took a deep breath and checking his surroundings stepped into the hallway. Nick followed quickly after making sure to cover the area behind Wolford as the two officers quickly cleared the hall. Slowly making their way towards the beavers apartment, they kept clearing corners and look out for possible booby traps. No further threats materialized along the way, and as the officers reached the apartment, Nick tried the door and found it locked.

Nick and Ralph formed up to the apartment and as Nick prepared to kick in the door something suddenly stopped him. Years of hustling we're screaming at him that things were wrong. What would be the point of booby trapping the stairwell and leave the hallway clear? The fox looked around and saw further down the hall exactly what he needed. The fire extinguisher he saw was large and thick enough to be able to break the door.

Wolford who had regarded the fox skeptically finally understood Wilde's intent as the fox returned with the extinguisher. The two officers took position next to the door, and at Ralphs nod, Nick swung the extinguisher sideways with all his might and slammed it into the door. The door cracked and turned inwards, but no second later an electric blast sounded in the hallway, and a deadly blast of electricity flew past the shocked officers. Nick and Ralph threw themselves back against the wall and prepared for a lethal response. Ralph set his shockgun to 'stun medium' and while holding the gun to the door opening shot blindly three bolts into the apartment. Nick than with lethal settings went into the apartment quickly clearing it.

His scan showed no hostiles and looking back he saw the set up that the killer had prepared for them. The smoldering remains of what must have been a shock gun smoked while wires attached to it led towards the door. At first glance, it was not exactly clear how this trap had been set up, but the fox would leave that for the investigation team to figure out. Together with Wolford, they made sure to check every room, but the killer hadn't stayed around. "Wilde here apartment is secure." Nick looked around and while noticing the broken window also noticed the distinct lack of signs of a struggle anywhere.

The four officers now were facing a big problem. Seven floors to secure with a killer present that had a love for leaving booby traps.

* * *

As their friends and colleagues were trapped playing a deadly game of hiding and seek Judy and Cindy got more and more exasperated with their general lack of finding any new leads.

The chicken corpses had not provided more clarity. In fact, they had done just the opposite. Most had been cut up using daggers and or knives the cut wounds straight and clean, but two of them had clear signs of being serrated with claws. Had there been a predator or two been mixed with the prey youth? Or had predator teens forced a prey resident to let them clean themselves up in the apartment and if so why hadn't the residents come forward when the police were there.

The cage itself hadn't given up much either. The only clue that looked a little promising were some pink hairs that had gotten stuck to the handle that had been used to carry it. It wasn't much to go on, and it could even not be related, but on the other hand, there weren't many mammals that dyed their hair pink. If they issued a b.o.l.o. across the city, they should be able to find some and ask if they knew anything more about the cage.

Cindy groaned as she rubbed her tired eyes. She had spent the last three hours using the lab equipment to cultivate dna samples from all the collected blood. Just like all the test, the technicians had done before her all came back as being chicken blood. The red panda had expected it but still had hoped to find something more for them to go on.

Judy smiled wryly as she too started to tire from their constant reexamining of samples and cadavers. As she was about to speak up to see if Cindy was interested in a five-minute break to get a cup of coffee Clawhauser rushed in.

"Hopps! Soniko! Fangmeyer just called in a murder on your crime scene. And at the moment dispatch is getting flooded with calls from residents who have heard an explosion and the discharge of shockguns. Bogo has ordered a mass responce of officers to assist."

The rabbit felt her blood go cold as she immediately thought about her boyfriend being in the middle of all that. Her chair was sent flying as she leaped from it and grabbing her temporary partner by her wrist tightly as she ran towards their cruiser.

Soniko only had seconds to adjust to what was happening and found herself half running half being dragged. As they passed the atrium, she looked down and saw the mass commotion of officers gearing up and running towards the parking lot. When the ZPD mobilized they didn't rut about that was for sure.

The girls reached their cruiser and jumped in. Judy quickly buckled it and looked over to make sure Cindy had secured herself before hitting the sirens and flooring the gas, causing the cruiser to race out of the parking lot. As the red panda pushed herself into the seat as the scenery zipped past the bunny spoke up. "Hold on to something cause this is gonna be a very bumpy ride."

Cindy closed her eyes she became aware of multiple sirens in front and behind them. The red panda shook herself mentally and steeled her resolve. While the drive was intense, it probably was nothing compared to what their coworkers were facing.

As Judy raced past a bus, she felt the dark pressure of dread, and she had to force herself not to think about how Nick might be hurt or worse. As she pushed the gas pedal all the way to the bottom only one thought was inside her. ' _Hold on guys. Help is coming_.'

* * *

In the meantime, someone was having the time of his life. He had to admit that the officers had exceeded his expectations and he was thrilled that they had managed to trap him on the upper floors. If he had just killed the guy like he was ordered to do the killer could have used the police uniform, he was wearing like planned.

Kill troublemaker, make a ruckus, let mammals see you leave in your disguise and mammals all across zootopia would lose trust in the predator officers on the force. Still, he hadn't come all this way just to play spy games. He had come for a pred/prey war, and if he needed to strike a spark to set of the powder keg than by all means, he wouldn't hesitate.

However, he had to admit he had underestimated them. He had set up the shockgun placement beforehand and making sure his second surprise was ready to be installed had checked if the cops were still in the alley. Then everything was just so easy. Throw the corpse out. Set up the trap on the stairwell. Hide on the fourth floor ready with shockgun in case they checked it. Then when the trap had gone off, he had waited a couple of minutes listening before noticing the cops had gone down.

He then had silently entered the stairwell, but felt the pressure of someone further down and had decided to travel up. Now on the seventh floor, he didn't have anywhere left to go and was now excitedly making new plans. He still had some shock grenades left, and while he had sacrificed his shockgun, he still had some daggers left he could put to good use.

Then he felt the irritation of his disguise. The uniform was perfectly suited and fitted him fine, but the costume was itchy and made every action he took more arduous to perform. It had been a close call, or the officers would have caught him closing the door to the fourth floor before they noticed him.

It wouldn't be long though before more police would show up and start clearing the levels one by one till they got him. In the worst case scenario he could always take a hostage or two, but from what he had understood from the information provided the only pred residents had been on the second floor so he could only take prey hostage. Something he didn't want to do. As he looked for another means of escape, he noticed something against the wall.

' _Well, cops you have won round one. Sadly my disguise will not fulfill the role it was intended for, but at least you won't catch me_ '. As the killer softly laughed to himself, he moved down the hallway gathering the items needed to help in his escape.

* * *

Nick and Ralph had joined up with Nadine and Harris again and were discussing the best way to proceed. With a mad mammal boobytrapping everything searching the apartment building was just screaming for one of them to get hurt, but not doing it was akin to leaving one of the residents to trigger one of them.

As they were about to formulate a strategy they heard and saw the first cruiser pull up. The officers backup was arriving. McHorn and Higgins exited their vehicle and ran up to them. "What's the situation?" Their question was short and to the point making it easier for them to clue the new arrivals in.

Quickly formulation their strategy to proceed it was decided that Higgins and McHorn would cover the front entrance making sure to take note of everyone that was leaving. The four of them would start clearing out the levels getting the residents out of harm's way while at the same time making sure the killer didn't escape.

Their plan was simple to go up a level where Harris and Nadine would cover the floor above them so the killer couldn't slip past while Nick and Ralph would secure the hallway making sure the killer wasn't hiding there or had left any of his presents. Then when the corridor was deemed safe, they would alert the residents and make them evacuate. When they reached the front entrance, they would be processed by the cops at the door, and any additional backup would join up with them and help with clearing the floors.

As far as plans went, it was the best they had and the four officers while covering each other's blind spots started heading up to the second floor again. They had trouble at the doors though as now they couldn't say for certain if they had been tampered with making them waste time checking every inch of it to make sure.

As Umbra and Fangmayer kept them covered. Nick and Ralph opened the door to the second hallway and started clearing it. As far as they remembered none of the residents of this floor had seemed suspicious, but it wasn't said that the killer hadn't forced his way into one of the apartments and was keeping the residents against their will. Clearing the hallway the officers proceeded to knock on every apartment and ordering it's inhabitants to evacuate the building. While some protested most were cooperative, and it only took fifteen minutes before the floor was secured.

Nick was cursing inwardly this was taking much to long and every minute that was wasted gave the killer more time against them to plan strategies and put up surprises. As he was about to suggest them to start speeding up their evacuation process, he heard the voice he had been craving all day. "NICK!"

Looking down he saw the face of the bunny he loved. Judy looked up at him shockgun drawn pointed towards the ground. He could see how her features slowly relaxed as her eyes scanned his body looking for any wounds. ' _Oh, my poor bunny. You must have been so worried_.' Nick made a vow to himself to make sure to give his girlfriend some extra cuddling time when they got off as he was sure she would need it tonight.

* * *

On the seventh floor, the preparations were ready. The killer had understood the intent of the cops, and he had to admit as strategies went it was a good one, but sadly he had secured his escape and now it was time to put his plan into action. Lighting a match, he threw it in the wastebasket and smiled while the uniform and disguise started to burn _'well hopefully you guys enjoy shifting through soot.'_

He slowly walked towards the wall grabbing the second part of his plan as the smell of smoke started to fill the hallway. ' _Now my cunning adversaries let's see how you deal with this._ '

* * *

As Judy and Soniko joined up with the four officers clearing the building the sound of a massive explosion rocked through the building and as fire alarms started blaring the residents of the floors above ran into the stairwell trying to escape.

As screams began to fill the apartment complex, Nick could only curse at his own ineptitude to see this coming. He locked eyes with Judy, and they both understood the situation "We're boned."


	12. Chapter 11 - Checkmate?

**Chapter 11: Checkmate?**

Mr. McWool was watching his two-year-old while his wife was taking their oldest for his vaccinations when he had heard the first explosion and what had sounded like shockgun discharges. As a concerned citizen, he had dialed the police immediately, and the dispatcher had assured him that they had been made aware and police officers were en-route to their location. The dispatcher had also told him to stay in his apartment and not go out.

That was advice he hadn't needed to hear as he had no intention to leave his apartment with his child as long as maniacs were shooting up the place. Sadly that was before the second explosion sounded on his floor and he was forced to reevaluate his position as the fire alarms started to blare all through the building.

Realizing he didn't have a choice he grabbed several blankets from the cupboard soaking one and laying them on the bed. He softly grabbed his daughter and kissed her on the head before wrapping her up in the blankets. If the fire was going to be as worse as he feared, at least, he could make sure she was safe. He held her to his chest and made his way to his front door psyching himself up for what he feared was a blaze on the other side of it.

Taking a couple of deep breaths, he thought his escape plan through. _'Stay low. Head left towards the stairs and then down all the way before exiting. If that way is blocked go right and head to emergency stairs.'_ He hated to take the emergency stairs. The ones that got installed were nothing more than a ladder surrounded by a safety cage mounted on the wall. Descending them while holding his daughter would be extremely difficult, but if push came to shove he would rather break his neck than let harm come to her.

He knelt down, felt his door for heat and not feeling any opened up the door. The first thing he noticed was the distinct lack of fire. Then he saw that foam had filled up the whole hallway. McWool knew that the fire prevention devices in his building were top notch, but this must have been done by detonation all the foam capsules from the top three floors at least. The foam capsules had been designed as a last resort defense as the foam wasn't potent enough to fight the fire. The spread of the capsules was rather small. However, if you were smart about it and detonated them at key locations, the foam could slow the fire enough to give mammals those extra precious minutes to escape the blaze.

Detonation three floors worth of capsules would explain the explosion and massive cloud of foam though, but why do this? He quickly left his apartment and headed towards the stairway when he noticed the smiling mammal heading his way. The evil smile said enough and McWool understood that the bastard wouldn't let him get back to his apartment. _'Well come on_ rutter _. I'll show you what a mammal defending his child is worth.'_

* * *

In the meanwhile, the police officers had fallen back to the first floor. The chance that the killer would engage them on the stairway with all the residents trying to escape was a too high a risk to take. Not only would the chance there be fatalities under innocent mammals be too big, but no officer would like to have a death of an innocent on their conscience. Bogo had ordered everyone out, and officers had surrounded the entire building. As the mammals were leaving the officers quickly cleared them and after taking down their names let them take shelter or send them to the ambulances that had just arrived.

The flow of residents had slowly gone down, and Chief Bogo was debating what to do next. He couldn't send his officers in with a possible fire going on, but he also couldn't allow the fire department to enter the building with a maniac with booby traps present. It was a perfect catch twenty-two.

As he was debating with the fire chief what their next move should be, he heard a shout for help coming from the front door. A mammal covered from head to toe with fire delaying foam was holding a bundle of blankets. "Please help, please help me I was just attacked on the seventh floor by some sort of maniac."

He quickly gestured for Fangmeyer to help the poor mammal under all that foam. The chief recognized the foam as the ZPD had several installed in the station. They were life savers, but get covered in the stuff, and you found it was a bitch to get off yourself. Still for someone to be covered to such degree was unprecedented.

Nadine reached the unfortunate mammal and quickly guided him away from the apartment. "Don't worry sir. You are saved now. Now, what were you saying about being attacked by someone?"

The mammal she was guided coughed loudly, clearly showing he had swallowed some of the foam. Fangmeyer wasn't so clear about the foam as she had fallen asleep during the fire prevention measures class (she had just come off a big case and hadn't slept for a couple of days at that time), but she was sure about one thing. Swallowing the stuff meant you had to visit the hospital. She quickly pushed the mammal with the bundle in his arms towards an ambulance.

"I just left my apartment with my baby son when some mad mammal came up to me and attacked me. Luckily I managed to punch him out, but by then my boy and I had already breathed in this damn foam. From what I saw the bastard was the one that set them off." Nadine tried to get a clear look at the mammal, but the foam was covering almost all of him, and she could only make out that he probably was a sheep. Here and there she could get some features, but she made a mental not to let the mammal leave police custody before they got this stuff of-of him.

"Sir one more question it's important. Did you see any fire while you were coming down?" The fact that the foam capsules had been set off could mean that someone had tried to fight the fire and if they had done so with as many capsules, it could say that they succeeded.

"Don't worry there is no fire. The bastard put some stuff in a waste basket and lit that on fire to set off the alarm."

"Thank you, sir, that will be all for now." Nadine using her radio quickly informed all the officers present that the fire was a diversion and that they had a suspect currently incapacitated on the seventh floor. After she had finished, she called over Soniko. "Stay with this gentle mammal and his son and make sure to get his statement when he's treated by the hospital, and the doctor has cleared him to take questions." Cindy nodded and quickly boarded the ambulance with the cloud of foam the victim was at present and the bundle of blankets which held his son.

Fangmeyer quickly shut the doors and knocked a couple of times on them to let the driver know to pull out. As the ambulance sirens sounded through the air, she turned around and prepared for the confrontation that laid ahead of them.

 _'OK, mister killer your escape attempt has failed miserably. Now for round two.'_ The tiger cop smiled humorlessly. First, there had been blind panic for a couple of seconds before their training had set in and they had composed themselves enough to start evacuation the residents. Not long after the order from Bogo to pull had come through and the officers had quickly left. The killer had failed to materialize though, but seeing as the sheep had knocked him out it made perfect sense.

Chief Bogo was quickly ordering the officers watching the emergency exits to be extra vigilant seeing as they now had a killer trapped with no escape. And he knew from experience that even mice offenders had become brutal when they were cornered. A murderer with a penchant for booby traps would only get more dangerous if he were up against the same wall. This made him decide that because of their smalls stature Nick, Judy, and Harris were the best choice to investigate the seventh floor.

* * *

The three officers prepared to go in again. They had been issued uniforms and body armor the chief had the swat team bring over from the precinct. As they were changing in the swat van, Bogo gave a quick explanation about the functionality. He also told them that they would be getting the uniform and body armor officially when the clothes had passed a field test that had been scheduled for next week. However, with the danger, he was going to send them into he had no qualms about issuing them as an exception for this situation.

After they had finished changing and making sure their equipment was fully functioning and loaded the officers and the swat members formed up at the door. At the back alley, another set of swat officers also got ready to enter. The plan was simple swat who were better armored would breach first. They would secure the entire first and second floor making sure to keep everything locked down to provide their little colleagues with a safe area they could fall back to in case of trouble. After the floors had been secured the three mammals would sneak up to the seventh trying not to get noticed. If the killer were still in the seventh, they would report, and swat would move up to sixth. At that time they would try to make contact and see what the threat level the mammal presented. If he was still down, they were to secure and restrain him, but if he was mobile again, the called in the swat and let them handle it.

In case the killer wasn't at the seventh anymore, they were to secure the seventh and make sure the killer didn't come back up while swat started combing the floors one by one till they caught him.

Nick was slowly breathing in and out preparing for the breach. _'Ok slick breach in ten that gives you five seconds to freak out. What am I doing out here? Four. Just over a year ago I was still selling popsicles and making a decent enough living out of it! Three. There is no way I'm capable of doing this. Two. How am I going to keep Judy save! The bastard is literally trying to kill us. One. I don't want to lose her if I lose her I'll be lost. Showtime.'_ Nick let out one last breath and locked all his emotions away. He found that letting all his fears, no matter how improbable, go wild for a couple of seconds before composing himself again not only calmed his nerves but also gave him an edge. The fox felt more focused, more alert.

The swat leader who had been counting down with his paw for all to see let his last finger disappear and the group moved into the building. This was relayed to the group who had formed up at the back, and they slammed a battering ram into the door breaking the post and forcing it back open. The teams went through the first floor without incident while Nick, Judy, and Harris made sure to cover the stairwell.

After the first floor was secure, the second one was done in the same fashion, and not much later everything was ready for them to start the recon of the seventh. There had been a small but significant bit of trouble as Judy and Nick both wanted to take the point position. The swat leader, however, had intervened and decided in Nick's favor that the fox should lead. While this infuriated the rabbit as she believed her boyfriend had been in enough danger already, she also resolved herself to make sure to have his back.

The three officers slowly made their way up the stairs. The door at the third hung open and the open area behind it was a source of concern, but the three officers quickly cleared the hallway behind it before heading further up. After each door, they passed Harris made sure to cover it till it was out of sight so the killer couldn't perform a surprise attack at their rear.

When they reached the seventh, they formed up at the door. The cops were tense it had been over half an hour since they had sent the last victim to the hospital and by all probability, the killer would have regained consciousness by now. After making sure by softly opening the door an inch that there were no nasty surprises on the other side the officers prepared to enter. The plan was to stay low and go slow. Harris would make sure their exit remained secure, and Nick and Judy would try to locate the killer.

Umbra opened the door and the fox and bunny while crouched moved into the hallway. It was as the witness had described it there was foam everywhere. The fox smelled the scent of blood. It was small, but distinctive enough to come through the smell of the foam and he reached over and tapped Judy on the shoulder. The bunny looked at him questioning, and he pointed towards the way the smell was originating from.

Judy quickly nodded and covered him while he took point moving slowly down the hallway. As they neared the end of the corridor, they saw a still form lying near an open apartment door. The mammal had apparently not regained consciousness, but Judy was not taking any chances. As her boyfriend ever so slowly neared the mammal to put the cuffs on him, she made sure to have her shockgun trained on the unconscious form. If she even saw what could have been a twitch, she would let him have it.

When the cuffs were on, and they were sure the ram was not waking up they called in the arrest. Chief Bogo relaxed a little, but he still ordered swat to start clearing the rest of the floors to make sure there were no more hidden surprises.

Nick in the meantime was looking at the ram. Something was nagging him, but he wasn't sure what it was. Looking around the fox saw the waste basket used to set off the fire alarm and moved to check it out. What he found was the sad remains of what looked like fake fur and some sort of uniform. _'Alright, some kind of disguise. Now Nick why would someone knowingly burn a perfectly good costume if they didn't want to get recognized afterward?'_ It didn't add up. The killer had been methodical in his actions, but attacking a resident without knowing if he could win didn't sound like an act he would perform.

The fox started to breathe harder. _'It couldn't be could it?'_ As he thought that he opened the door to the apartment and started quickly looking through the rooms trying to find something that would prove his fears wrong. He found what he was looking for in the living room, but it made his hair stand on end. Running back to Judy he keyed up his radio. "This is officer Wilde. The suspect has escaped the building. I repeat the suspect has escaped."

The chief quickly keyed in his radio. "Wilde what are you on about. What do you mean he escaped?"

Nick reached his partner, and as she looked him in astonishment, he handed over the picture he had taken from the living room. She looked at it and then as her eyes widened looking at the cuffed suspect. They had currently handcuffed the victim mister McWool.

* * *

Fangmeyer was in shock. She had led the killer towards the ambulance and never bothered to check his identity. What was worse she had ordered the new blood to accompany him. She grabbed her radio. "Officer Soniko what's your current condition?"

As the seconds without response stretched out, she tried again. Then again. All the while the radio kept ominously quiet.

The chief swore under his breath and turned his radio on. "Dispatch please be advised the suspect has managed to evade police custody. Last seen entering ambulance heading to Zootopia general. Please let them know that suspect is onboard and have units ready at the hospital to secure. All units currently patrolling the sector between here and there are to head up and try to intercept."

Clawhausers nervous voice came back through the radio. "Understood chief sending all units towards the sector. Please be advised that we've just received communication from Zootopia general that they have lost contact with one of their ambulances."

As this came over the radio, Nadine closed her eyes. _'Stupid, stupid, stupid. You should have gone. Not send some rookie, because it seemed less dangerous.'_ She opened her eyes again and started to move towards her cruiser. "RALPH!" Wolford looked around and caught her eye. No words were needed to be said, and the wolf raced over while the tiger buckled herself in. The sirens sounded as the pair had not been the only ones going after their colleague.

Chief Bogo hadn't given the order for his officers to go after them, but he was proud of them for their quick decision-making skills. However, he still had a job to do here. He gave instructions to the swat leader that he now was in charge of the scene and continue securing the building. Then he raced as quickly as his cruiser allowed in pursuit of the ambulance and the mad mammal in it.

* * *

About halfway between the murder scene and Zootopia general, a ambulance had crashed into the side of the road. While the lights were still going the siren was winding down. The blow seemed to have opened the back doors, and the soft cries of a baby could be heard. As drivers started to pull over to see if they could lend assistance a mammal covered in gunk walked away. 'Good try cops. Till next time.'


	13. Chapter 12 - Healing and dying

**Authors note:**

 **I've had a difficult time trying to write the part of Fangmeyer and Wolford. The part needed several rewrites as I felt that the characters started to behave out of character (what is quite an achievement of itself as the movie didn't really give them much characterization, to begin with). Please let me know if I got the part right. Now without further ado the continuation.**

* * *

 **Chapter 12: Healing and dying.**

The situation was bad. The police had been too eager to get a 'father' and his child out of harm's way and unwillingly let 'the father' get away. Then realizing their mistake subsequently caught up too late. Chief Bogo was plainly aware of these facts and what was even worse that it happened under his nose. He couldn't and wouldn't fault his officers for this screw up as the blame was on all of them. Still, he knew he shouldn't blame himself and his officers too hard as what had seemed like a simple investigation into a prank gone wrong had scaled up so quickly to murder and then even further as the mad mammal attacked the zpd itself. He had to give it to his officers. They had managed to not only halt the suspect but managed to do so without further loss of life.

Sadly as they had cleared the building, the father had played an impressive role with his 'son' and had conned his way right into a waiting ambulance. Bogo wondered when the fight in the ambulance had started. Was it after officer Soniko had been alerted during the examination of the child that the 'son' turned out to be female. Or had the maniac attacked her even before the examination the paramedic would have conducted on the child before checking 'dad.' Bogo sighed. As it stood, he had one paramedic with a concussion caused by what seemed like a severe blow to the head. An ambulance driver shot by shock gun, which resulted in the immediate crash the ambulance suffered following that event, and last but not least officer Soniko who was now sporting multiple wounds and bruises. Also, her uniform had shown her being hit at close range not once but two times with shock bolts to the chest and if that was not bad enough all three mammals had also suffered additional wounds that resulted from the crash of the ambulance. What had been the small blessing was that the daughter, of the victim recovered from the apartment building, seemed to have gone through all of this coming out reasonably fine receiving only minor bruising and a small cut on her left paw that a paramedic covered with a band-aid.

The chief closed his eyes feeling the anger flare up inside himself. He always saw his officers as part of his family and if one of them got hurt it had an immediate impact on him and the rest of the force. Still, he had to keep his cool as he was in the waiting room with the officers family present and he had to stay strong to support them. The doctors were still busy treating the victims, and while the first indications were positive, it was still too soon to relax.

He looked over to the family. Her mother sitting with her boys hugged close to her chest while the dad kept standing not being able to relax. The chief had asked the red panda if he could do anything to assist him as it was clear that one of his legs seemed to bother him, but he wouldn't hear of it. Bogo wondered how long it would be before there was any word from the doctors relating to the state of the victims.

"Mom, when do you think we can see Cindy?" The question asked by one of the boys was asked so softly the buffalo had been unsure if he had heard it or that his mind was just playing tricks on him to distract himself.

"I don't know honey. We just have to be patient for now." The mother gave her son a sad smile and gave him a hug and a soft kiss on his head.

"She's gonna be alright though isn't she?" The other boy was looking anxious, and it was clear that having his sister brought to the hospital following the attack was causing immense distress to the young child.

"Don't worry son your sis is just going to be just fine." The dad had come over and answered his son although Bogo could hear the hint in the tone it got said in that the father was trying to convince himself more of this fact than that he was trying to convince his son.

Just as the buffalo was about to ask the family if he could get them something to drink or anything else to try to lift the weight of dread currently on them the doors opened and the doctor he had spoken to earlier came in. The mother quickly put her boys down and stood up as her husband came to stand next to her. "Mister and missus Soniko?" The red panda's quickly nodded their heads, and the doctor looked over to chief Bogo before continuing talking to the parents.

"First off let me tell you that we have extensively checked your daughter and have found no life threatening wounds external or internal. The injuries that we have found were easily treatable and will heal completely with rest." As the doctor finished explaining the mother started crying having been freed finally from the fear that had consumed her following the phone call she had received from the chief of police himself.

The doctor gave the parents a couple of seconds to digest the information he had given them before continuing. "However as you might have been told," He glanced over at the chief checking if the buffalo had indeed informed the parents that their daughter had been shot. Bogo only nodded, and the doctor continued. "your daughter has received not only one but two bolts of electricity to her body. While nothing seems to be amiss, we are going to need her having to stay for a couple of days to make sure nothing is indeed wrong before we release her. At this time do you have any questions you wish to ask me?"

The red panda's looked at each other and then the father asked the one question that any parent would ask. "Can we see her?"

The doctor nodded his consent. "Yes, you can. She has been currently admitted to the ICU so she can be monitored. If you would follow me." The red panda's and the chief started following the doctor and as they entered the ICU saw their daughter lying on a hospital bed. Lilly softly shed some tears. The healthy beautiful police officer she had seen off that morning seemed so small and weak now lying in a bed several sizes too large for her. The red panda felt a gentle squeeze on her shoulder and grabbed and held the paw of her mate for a couple of seconds to draw some strength from him. If one thing were necessary at this moment, then it would be that she stayed steadfast for her daughter and sons.

The chief was taken apart by the doctor while the family moved closer to be near the patient on the bed. "Your officer is likely to wake up later this evening or tomorrow morning. I must stress though the importance that you do not burden her at this moment as she needs complete rest. This also means you can't question her until at least the day after tomorrow." Bogo had expected he wouldn't be allowed to ask his officer what had happened today, but the force was in desperate need for any and all information the officer in the bed could give them. As he made a mental note to make sure to send Hopps and Wilde in the next couple of days, to debrief their charge on the events that had occurred before the crash, he watched Cindy's mom move over to be at her side.

Softly sitting on the bed, Lilly gently lets her hand caress her daughters face as she watched her sleeping form. She leaned over and pressed a kiss on her forehead and was about to move away before Cindy slowly opened her eyes. For Lilly, the fact that her daughter was not as severely wounded as they feared, but also had woke up so soon was the sign she needed that everything would be alright. Mark and the boys came over as well and, as Bogo watched on with a small smile on his face, the family embraced Cindy carefully never having felt more relieved.

* * *

Fangmeyer and Wolford entered their apartment and as Ralph hung up his jacket saw Nadine throw hers across the living room, in an apparent show of anger and annoyance. The chief had taken them, as well as Nick, Judy, and Harris of the case as it was now a murder investigation. They had been ordered to hand over all the evidence as well as all the information they had acquired to homicide. It was logical, but it still stung that the investigation into the bastard that had hurt one of their own was now the duty of someone else.

Nadine had taken it particularly hard and had tried to argue with Bogo until the chief had ordered her to let it go or face the consequences. Ralph had taken it upon himself to grab his tiger and steer her to their squad car before the argument would devolve into something serious which could end with Nadine getting reprimanded or even suspended. Still, his girlfriend had not gone quietly, and she was steaming all the way back to their apartment.

As Ralph looked on, he saw Nadine grab the kitchen counter while turning on the faucet before putting her head under the cold water stream. The wolf saw her trying to get herself under control again, but it hurt him that she was dealing with this by herself instead of confiding with him like she always did. He had an inkling though what was really bothering her, and it wasn't that she had been taken off the case. Still, it would be better to get her to say what it was that got her so torn up so they could work through it.

"Wanna tell me what this is all about partner?" The question seemed safe enough to start with and opened up the dialog they needed to have.

"What do you think Ralph? We're sidelined! The rutter got away, and we are now stuck on the sideline with our thumbs stuck up our backsides!" Nadine was standing still holding on tightly to the counter as she softly shook with anger. Ralph sighed as it seemed he would need to be tougher on her to make her crack. It wasn't healthy how at this moment she tried to keep everything in. He moved closer and grabbed a beer out of the fridge.

"Yeah it sucks that we're off the case, but we've been benched before if the situation became out of our field and it's never affected you this bad. What really has you riled up Nadine?" Ralph took a sip from his beer and looked as his tiger put her head beneath the stream again. It had taken a couple of seconds before she responded.

"He escaped Ralph. We had the killer, and we just let him walk out of there. I escorted him to the ambulance. If I had thought to check him, I might have been able to bust the bastard." Ok closer to the truth, but he knew what she was hiding. Sometimes you had to be a little cruel to be kind.

"Kitty, please tell me what's hurting you..." Nadine closed her eyes and let her tears flow. It was so unfair of Ralph to use his nickname for her when they were romantic to get her to open up.

"I asked her to accompany him! Okay! It's on me that's she's in the hospital! She might not make it, and I'm the one responsible!" As she broke down, she slowly sat down on her knees with her head pressed against the cabinets as she shook with rage and shame. Ralph sat behind her and putting his arms around her as far as they went gave her a comforting hug.

"Shhhh, Kitty it's going to be okay. Soniko is tougher than her size would suggest. And I didn't get the feeling she was dying from the way the paramedics worked on her." He softly kissed Nadine on her cheek, and she turned and grabbed her wolf needing the comfort only her mate could supply her with at that moment. As she hugged the wolf to her chest, he kissed her under her muzzle and softly stroked her back. "I asked the chief to keep us updated on her condition, and if you want to check for yourself we can visit her tomorrow ok?"

Nadine nodded sadly as she kissed her boyfriend. The guilt of what had happened still weighed heavily on her and she hoped that the rookie would be fine because otherwise, she feared she would never forgive herself.

They sat like that for quite some while all the time exchanging kisses and comforting each other. Kissing one last time they had calmed down enough and Ralph stood up and offered a paw to Nadine. She smiled gratefully at her Wolf. Nadine never considered herself a dainty little girl to be fawned over by a male, but Ralph always seemed to know when to dote on her and when to let her to the doting.

As she stood up the phone started to ring, and Ralph answered it. Nadine watched him with anxious feelings as the wolf kept nodding to what the caller was saying and ended the call sounding rather pleased. The tiger watched her boyfriend replace the receiver. Ralph gave her a big smile. "That was the chief. Soniko just woke up, and the doctors are pretty sure she will make a full recovery."

At those words, the tiger grabbed her wolf and kissed him with all she was worth while holding him in a loving embrace. For a day that had gone so terribly wrong, it had at least ended on a little bit of happiness.

* * *

While Ralph comforted Nadine an other pair of cops was going through the back alleys located close to the crash site. "Remind me again Carrots why we are following the killer's scent even though the chief has ordered us of the case?"

"The reason is Slick that Bogo is correct that it's now homicide's jurisdiction, but before they are up to speed valuable evidence might be lost. We are going to follow the scent and see how far we come. If we are lucky, we might be able to salvage something to hand over to the detectives."

"And if we find the killer?" Nick had to shake his head at his girlfriend. Normally Judy was the 'by the book' officer of their pairing while he liked to play loose with the rules. He believed it one of the reasons why they were so successful in solving cases. However to find their roles suddenly somewhat reversed was new and secretly exciting for the tod.

"Then we make sure we get an id and get the department in on this. I for one do not want the killer getting away again." Judy was still angry that the suspect had escaped. She, Nick and Harris couldn't join the chase as they had to make sure the victim got to the hospital okay and after that make sure the rest of the apartment building was clear of any more traps. As they finally had reached the scene, it had been all over, and they were informed by the investigators, going over every inch of the crashed ambulance, of the chiefs decision to pull them from the case.

"Just checking." Nick lowered his head again and took a deep sniff. The smell of fire repression was still followable, but he had to admit that Judy had been right. Give it another ten to fifteen minutes, and the trail would have been gone. The pair set off again as Nick kept sniffing while they passed several more alleys before he held up his hand. Judy crouched down next to him and started to swivel her ears to try to pick up any sounds of any treats. Hearing nothing, she looked at her boyfriend, and he made several gestures. Since the Nighthowler case, he had spent several evenings teaching her the signals he had learned on the street, and this time she understood immediately what he meant: 'something strange further up the alley, going in first, make sure to watch my back.' He held up two thumbs, and she nodded once before unholstering her shock gun.

The two cops quietly moved down the alley and as they reached the thing that had set Nicks instincts of they looked at each other. The ground had been cluttered with foam and fur, and it was easy to see that the killer had tried to remove most of the fire resilient material to make himself more presentable. "Seems he wanted to disappear into the general public." Nick looked down the alley and saw that it opened up to a busy street. "Might be worth seeing if there are any security cameras around that have a view of the alley opening."

Judy nodded her agreement. "It's worth a shot. Seeing as he was busy with trying to blend in, he might have missed them while walking out of here." The bunny grabbed several evidence bags out of her pocket as well as some rubber gloves and went about collecting the samples noticing that a lot of hairs had become trapped in the foam. "Might get a dna sample out of these."

The fox looked around and noticed a splotch of something darker further down the alley. "Hey, Carrots is it me or is that the contents of someone's stomach?"

The bunny looked at were the fox was pointing and walked over. "Yep, definitely a hayburger. Wonder if this is the killer's lunch." As she spoke, she suddenly opened her eyes wide as her boyfriend took his gloved paw and picked up something out of the sick. "Really Nick? Next time use a swab or something."

"This is the killer's stomach content alright." At this, the bunny had to look surprised. She took another look at the puddle of sick, but apart from the remains of what probably was a hayburger couldn't see anything that gave the fox the evidence needed that this sick belonged to the killer.

"Speak to me Slick, why do you think this lovely puddle of barf is the property of 'murder are us'?"

As the fox stood up, he showed what was on the end of his finger. "The foam stuck in it. He wasn't acting when he was coughing his lungs out on the scene. Our killer has inhaled the foam."

Judy's eyes widened at this revelation. The foam normally was not a problem. The fabricant who produced it had also produced a gas that could break it down quickly in case it was breathed in. The only issue was that it needed to be administered in the right dose for the animal who needed it. Give too much, and it just poisoned the mammal in question, give too little, and the gas couldn't properly break down the chemicals in the foam. Therefore the fire department had been issued the gas for their first responders, in personal gas canisters that had been calculated to have the right amount of gas for the mammal using it. Hospitals had been given large tanks, and only anesthetists were allowed to administer the gas to mammals needing it.

It had been for that reason that the 'dad' had been hurried to the ambulance. It was no problem if the foam was removed by the gas. Just a day or two of recovery in bed and he would have been right as rain. Now he was not getting treatment, and it was a whole other ballgame. The foam would slowly, but surely poison the lungs causing the mammal in question to end up suffocating as the lungs would lose their ability to process air.

"We need to inform homicide and Bogo. If my guess is right, he must try to get treatment and with his hairs in our possession it's only a question of waiting for 'Oops my fire represent went off while installing it.' Then we slap the cuffs on him and stuff him in jail."

Judy shook her head. "He might try for the fire departments to get a canister of a mammal roughly his size. Or try to kidnap an anesthetist to try to get himself cured without us finding out. Also if he doesn't realize what is happening to his lungs, he might just end up dead before we reach him."

Emerald eyes met Violet ones, and the fox nodded. "There are still too many ways for him to try to get out of this huh? Then first things first let's get this evidence and our findings to Bogo. I have a feeling that if he learns of these facts, he will use them to build a snare the killer has no chance to escape from!"

The fox and rabbit finished collecting the evidence they needed and taking a last look around to make sure they hadn't missed anything ran towards the end of the alley. If there were cameras they needed to get the film from them, then the chief needed to be informed and last, but not least. There was a killer out there who, while slowly dying, was still in desperate need of a good bottom kicking.


	14. Chapter 13 - Out of the frying pan

**Authors note: First off. Sorry for the delay in posting this chapter. With my vacation finally arriving I've been busy dealing with finishing the projects I couldn't hand over at work and with spending time with the family as well as recuperating from work my writing suffered. Now though I have more time for my writing, so I hope that I'll be able to get our more chapters. Still with the family needing social time I might just be fooling myself. Who would have guessed that having more free time would mean you have less of it available to do your hobbies?**

* * *

 **Chapter 13: Out of the frying pan.**

The door to the briefing room slammed shut and all officers of the night shift straightened out. Normally there would have been the usual round of desk pounding to welcome the chief before he gave them their assignments. Now, however, there was eerie silence as all officers had seen the news before coming in. One of their own had been taken down, and it had not been at the mercy of the killer that she was still alive. If the double shot to the chest was not a clear indicator of his intent, then the fact that her shockgun was recovered still on the lethal setting sinched it.

The lab guys had found that it had probably been damaged during the initial struggle causing it to malfunction and thankfully unable to deliver a lethal shot. The techs, however, could not give conclusive evidence of the killer tried turning it to kill, or it was already there, but there was no way around it officer's Soniko's survival came all down to pure luck.

Bogo stood in front of his podium. Normally he would have a bunch of cases on the docket, but this evening he had none except one. "Good to see you all here. Time is short, and we have the clock running against us on this one so let's get down to business."

The meeting the chief had had with Hopps and Wilde had been short and while he secretly was glad they had ignored his order this time he still couldn't let them get away with it and was forced to chew them out. If he hadn't, it could have led to more officers thinking they knew better and going off to do their own thing. Therefore their behavior, while beneficial this time, couldn't stand, and the chief made damn sure that his officers knew that. Now, however, he knew one thing. The killer was working on borrowed time, and sooner or later he needed to remedy the situation he got himself in or die.

Bogo ordered several of his officers to secure the ZFD and hospitals, having sent out warnings to the other precincts to do the same. If the killer was going to try anything to save himself those were his only two viable options, and it would be a cold icy day in Hell itself indeed before the chief allowed the killer to escape custody again. As the first few sets of assigned officers cleared out, Bogo started assigning the remaining officers on specific patrol routes covering the homes of off duty anesthetists and the factories where the gas was produced on the slight off chance the killer would try for option number three. If he could secure the gas and the means to apply it, he could in theory still save himself. It would come at great danger to the killer himself seeing as the one using the gas could end up giving him too much or too little seeing as the anesthetist would be under an enormous amount of stress.

The last officers filed out, and the chief was glad the briefing was over. He had kept his emotions in check, but anyone that had known him for a time could tell that the buffalo's anger was just being restrained with the last strands of self-control the chief could muster. The happiness he had felt when his officer had awoken to the joy of her family had been replaced with deep seething ice cold rage when the lab boys had given their report.

The chief walked out of the briefing room. As of now, Bogo had multiple problems to contend with, and during his preparation for the night shift, he found the solution for several of them. Not only that, but a couple of the answers would tie up the officers that he needed to be occupied. This would take their minds of the investigation while performing the duties. As a bonus to them, it would be ones they had a personal interest in. As the chief smiled a humorless smile, he sat down at his desk and started to make preparations for the days to come.

* * *

When morning came around chief Bogo was feeling more relaxed than he had done the day before. The calls he had made assured him the cooperation of several individuals and the chief at the Bunnyborrow police department had jumped at the offer of having four of his officers over during the harvest festival. Now Bogo only had to make sure that his officers were kept busy and he knew exactly how he was going to be doing that.

He had already assigned the rest of the day shift their patrols and duties. The killer had not been seen that night, and the chief made sure to keep security details assigned to all likely spots he could show up. Now, however, he had reached the last of his officers, and it was time to appoint them, although the chief was sure they wouldn't like it one bit.

"Now for the last items on the docket." As he spoke, he saw the officers straighten up. All of them looking determined and there was no question in Bogo's mind they were raring to go chase the killer. "As you all know we've got a live demonstration coming up next week to determine the performance of the new uniform and body armor that's been developed the last couple of months. You all will help in the preparation of this test and take part in it."

As Hopps and Fangmeyer stood up to argue the chief silenced them with a glare. "SHUT IT! I know you all want a shot at the killer, but I need able officers to see to it that this demonstration goes off without a hitch and you all are currently compromised due to your links with officer Soniko." The bunny and tiger sat down again, but it was clear that no one in that room was happy with the assignment.

Bogo looked them over again before continuing. "We've found a willing participant that will take the role of the arresting officer. He will be wearing the new uniform as well as all the body armor, and it will be your job to try to take him down. You will be armed with shock guns set to medium, and he will be armed with a paint gun. If he manages to tag the three officers taking part, it will prove the strength of the set and the department will be allowed to assign the new clothes to all small officers present and future. It will also clear the way for the continued development of the larger sets."

Nick chose that moment to get some clarity on what was just said. "Sir. Who of us have you assigned to confront the volunteer?"

"Thank you for asking Wilde. With the level of training, the volunteer has at the moment, he will need all the additional training we can squeeze in the five days we have left till the exhibition. So the assignments will be as follows. Wilde, Wolford, Fangmeyer you three will be the ones going up against him. This way a mammal of every size is present at the test. Hopps, Umbra you two will be in charge of getting the volunteer up to as high a level as you can manage. If officer Soniko is allowed to come in before the test commences she can assist you two, but make no mistake she is not authorized to do any work that would strain her mentally or physically until she's cleared by me to do so."

Judy looked at Nick and stood up with a questioning look on her face. "Sir might I ask why Nick is chosen to be on the team. When it comes to the training grounds, I always beat him."

Nick turned to his partner and stuck out his tongue. "Great job with sparing my feelings there carrots."

The bunny turned back to her partner and gave him a knowing smirk. "Not putting you down Slick just stating the facts."

"Ok, you two that's enough. As why I chose Wilde over you is indeed that you are the most skilled in your partnership, therefore, you have more to contribute to the training regimen. Also, it has been noticed several times that during times of emergency you tend to be the one to take the reins and control the situation until a higher ranked officer is able to reach you. Your abilities and the skills that you display to guide others make you especially suitable for the position of training new recruits. You might not have heard, but even major Friedkin has expressed some interest in the past for having you and your partner come back in to help train the new recruits."

Judy and Nick stood up to protest at the same time. While they liked Ursula and wouldn't mind working with her, it would take them away from the streets they had sworn keep safe. Bogo knew he could have phrased that better and put up a hoof to cut off the pair before they could start complaining. "Please understand that the position of a trainer at the academy would be a tempory one at all times and would only be allowed during times when I would be sure I could miss the two of you. Also while I will not force you to accept the position when the possibility will come up, it may be wise to do so. If the mammals that come in for training see what the two of you are capable of it will expand the minds of your future larger coworkers and if word spreads may even induce smaller mammals to try the academy even if it's just to train with you."

The pair mulled it over and saw that the chief was right. Even though several small mammals were enlisting, it was nowhere near the numbers the zpd needed to bring up the force to where it needed to be.

Umbra raised his arm timidly and as Bogo glanced at him spoke up. "Ok I understand that Hopps is ideally suited to train the volunteer, but where do I come in? And if you want the best of the small mammals to train the volunteer why not Hopps and Wilde together with me going on the team that engages?"

"The reason for that Umbra is that you are familiar with the volunteer and can assist Hopps with evaluating his progress."

At this Umbra could only look confused. "Sir, might I inquire who we'll be training?"

Bogo took the photo that was in the file laying on his docket and handed it to the hare. "Your old classmate from the academy. The one you might remember for being kicked out. One Joe Fragrance."

* * *

Max Improbus thought not of himself as being an unreasonable mammal, but sometimes one found himself having to make decisions that might be construed by others to be difficult to accomplish, some might well claim them to be unreasonably difficult.

Still, if his employees did bring up the difficulty of the task he would always see to it they were properly motivated to accomplish them. Sometimes a kind word was enough. Other times threatening to kill one's entire family was required to achieve the result. It was ghastly to have to do, to be sure, but sometimes one needed to stoop a bit lower on the social hierarchy to get through to the filth that had the privilege to serve him.

Now he was looking down of what remained of what used to be his hitmammal. The goat had only been given two orders. Get rid of his fellow student and use the wolf disguise to make it seem that an officer of the ZPD had performed the deed. As far as his orders went only the first had been achieved reasonably within parameters, but then the goat had gone rogue. "I'm sure you currently see the error of disappointing me and to think I had such high hopes for you."

The raspy breaths that came from the goat as he looked through his beat up face made it all too clear that the foam Max suspected was in his lungs was already destroying them. "It could have been so great. The ZPD would lose a lot of cloud and predators would again be seen as the savages they really are. A chance so grand it was like the holidays had come early, but of course, you found a way to screw things up." With those last words, the rabbit kicked the goat in his stomach with all the strength he could muster lifting the hitmammal of the ground a little while he coughed loader caused by the lack of air.

"No, you had to start a personal war with the ZPD! And if you had killed several of the nasty preds that pretend to be officers I could have been purs-wayed to let it go, but you couldn't even manage to do that!" Max grabbed the goat by his head and lifted it to his face snarling in the hitmammal's frightened face. "You can count yourself lucky that I still have plans for you, but don't think you will be let out without a leash."

The rabbit moved back to his chair and snapped his fingers. At the sound, the two boars which had taken turns beating the goat into a bloody pulp stepped forward while holding something in their hoofs.

"Bellwether was a genius. You might have heard of the TAME collar the former mayor envisioned for all the nasty preds to be wearing. Well, I had several mammals go through her belongings before the ZPD confiscated everything. Among the items recovered were the original blueprints." The rabbit smiled wickedly at the goat. "Luckily for you, it will allow me to have total control of your actions in the future otherwise I would have let you die in agony. Now you will be fitted with two lovely items. First will be the unique TAME collar I had modified for your personal use."

One of the boars grabbed the goat and pulling him up by the fur on his head lifted him off the ground while the hitmammal groaned in pain. "You see my dear. I can't use mammals that don't follow orders. Defy mine again, and you will find that that shock collar activates sending more volts to you than would be needed to cook you alive!"

The boar holding the collar put it around the goat's neck and activated it. A beep could be heard, and the collar went from green to red in an instant. Small shocks of electricity flowed through the goat and as he groaned again in pain was let go to fall on the floor where he lay barely conscious with the lack of oxygen.

"Now for the other problem. See your lungs have had it. If you had surrendered yourself, the ZPD would have been more than willing to save you. Without the gas needed, however, you are going to die. Again luckily for you, while the gas becomes useless when you are so far gone as you are, we found a way to keep someone alive even if the lungs started to fail. By mixing liquid oxygen with the liquid form of the gas, we are able to keep your lungs going. Now don't make any mistake you are completely dependant on our oxy-gas-liquid canisters if you wish to remain alive so even if you managed to get rid of your collar it would be a short victory as I would see to it your supply would be cut off immediately."

The boar that had held the hitmammal up of the ground turned the goat on his back and using his knees pinned the mammal to the ground. After that was done, he grabbed the goats upper garments and with a sharp pull ripped them apart. The boar that had moved away to grab something else came back with what looked like a disk filled with fluids.

"Now my dear friend let me explain what is going to happen to you. That sphere you see will extend two very sharp pins that will ram directly into your lungs. After that is done they will fill them up with the liquid gas/oxy mix, and you will be able to breathe normally again, but you might ask yourself if the liquid wouldn't just leave your body through your mouth. Now you don't have to worry your little brain over that. My employees seeing to you are going to seal your throat shut. Not only will you never have to breathe again through your mouth, but you will never have to bother eating again either. Don't worry though all of your nutritional needs will be seen to by our doctor's on staff. They will make sure you get injected with your daily needed dose of 'food.'" The rabbit smiled evilly and snapped his fingers again.

The hitmammal looked with wide eyes at his captors as the boar with the disk put in on his bare chest. Then the boar grabbed what seemed like a rubber hose and rammed it down the goat's throat. Max had left his chair and was on his way out while the boars worked on the hitmammal. "Oh yeah boys when you finish with him, throw him in the standby room to recuperate, and then join me. Wouldn't want you to miss the lovely party going on upstairs." As the sounds of gagging and muffled screaming filled the office the rabbit closed the door and smiling wickedly ascended the stairs towards the ballroom. He had righted a wrong and gotten a new tool out of the deal to boot.

* * *

Near the park, another mammal had just finished up with the last of the camera placements. Everything was now ready for the live test that would in all probability take place on the weekend. He had been in the park when he saw his subject and her family coming towards him. As he listened in on their conversation, he had a tough time not screaming in joy as the mother told her daughter she would bring her and her siblings to the park again on Saturday.

Just a couple of days more and he would be able to see his work in action. If it all went like planned, he might be able to get some investors on board with his research and then his babies could finally go out to do the work they were designed for.

Now only to make sure the test would go off without a hitch. He had already ensured that there would be a distraction ready for the ZPD to be triggered when the subject finally decided to start the experiment. Hopefully, it would keep them busy long enough for him to reclaim her body when the trial was concluded. Having the samples, he could extract from it, ready to show to interested parties would be even better than just having the recorded footage.

As he moved back towards his vehicle, he nodded and smiled towards a young mother and her cub that were playing in the park. What he didn't see was how the mother frowned and grabbed her child to flee the park. There had been something in his smile that the mother hadn't understood, but had her senses go of warning her of immediate danger.

* * *

After the briefing, Judy was moving towards her cubicle. She had a training program to lay out as well as try to get access to the academy's training grounds. In a pinch, they probably could make due with precincts one exercise room, but for the training, she had in mind only the academies multiple eco systems simulated training courses would service. "What can you tell me about this Fragrance guy?"

Harris was following her currently busy reading up on file on his former classmate. "He was good. Kept up with Soniko even surpassing her for a couple of weeks before she got serious. After that, he kept on being a steady second place holder until they found drugs in his locker."

"Yeah, I heard something about that. Nick had a discussion with his friend about that drug incident. But the friend believed it had been a frame up job. What about you?" Judy looked back to see Harris his reaction.

Harris thought for a moment before answering. "I believe so. Joe looked as shocked as he could be and I don't see how he would have been able to get his hands on the drugs in the first place. The investigation should have convicted or cleared him, but..."

"There never was one." Judy finished for him. She frowned as she thought about the circumstances. There was no reason not to have an investigation. If he were found guilty, they would have arrested him and made him talk about where he had gotten the drugs from. Not taking any action to ensure no drugs would enter the academy again was a severe breach of protocol. Hell even if Fragrance was cleared of the suspicion they still needed to find out how drugs had entered the grounds.

Nick had been right they needed to do an investigation on the academy and now that she had time to think about it the sooner, the better. "Harris when was he kicked out?"

"We had less than a month left of training, and it was clear that Soniko and Fragrance would take the top two spots. Nobody could have caught up with them. I was in third place, and the margin between Joe and me was too wide to close in just a month." Harris still felt a bit bitter that the only reason he had been assigned to Precinct one had been the drug incident, but now he was here he would do everything in his power to prove that he deserved to be there.

"Hmm, for the time being, we have to concentrate on getting him back up to the level he needs to be to have any chance to hold out against three seasoned police officers working together. Don't worry though when the test is done, I'll ask Bogo personally to open up an investigation into what happened there."

Harris smiled, the time he had to spend competing with Joe and Cindy had been fun, and he still was shaken by how the skunk had been removed. Now, however, they might be able to clear him of the charges levied against him and get the skunk into the ZPD for real.


	15. Chapter 14 - Affirmations and reconcilia

**Authors note: My writing is going to be put on temporary hiatus. For details look in authors bio.**

* * *

 **Chapter 14: Affirmations and reconciliations**

Sarah and her grandmother were watching the morning news coming from ZNN. They were showing the footage from the police engagement the day before, and as the reporter on the scene was talking, about what she had heard and seen, the camera focused on the three geared up small police officers heading for the front entrance of the apartment building. Fabienne Growley talking over the rerun was quick to point out that the mammals seen in the video were officers Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde with an unknown officer assisting. Sarah didn't know how many hares and rabbits had joined the ZPD, but she was reasonably sure that there weren't a lot of them and the hare seen following the two well knows officers was most likely the mammal she had a date with on Saturday.

As the picture went back to show Fabienne Growley and Peter Moosebridge, Sarah started to worry. The picture had only shown the officers going in, but of the aftermath, no live coverage existed. And it was revealed later in the evening that one of the responding officers had been hurt and was taken to the hospital. ZNN had no further details about the condition of said officer or who it was at the time. Matters were not helped by the further reports about explosions and the crash of an ambulance leaving the scene.

The lioness looked at her cell phone for the fortieth time that morning. She wanted to check and to hear if her date was still ok, but she also didn't want to seem like she was trying to mine Harris for information. If he misread her intentions, she could be ruining their date beforehand, and that was something Sarah didn't want to happen.

"Why don't you call the sweet bunny Sarah?" Her grandmother was looking at her with a smile on her face. "I'm pretty sure he would like to hear from you if I read his gaze correctly."

"Nana we haven't even had our first date yet. I don't want him to think that I'll freak out every time something is reported about an officer being injured." Sarah took her cell phone in paw and looked at the display to see if she might have missed a call.

"When you two get together I'm pretty sure he'll be calling you to inform you of said incidents, before the news reports on them, to let you know he's alright, so you don't have to worry." Sarah knew her grandmother had a point and she wondered what would be an appropriate time to call Harris. She didn't want to disturb him during his work, but then it was not like she knew the hours he would be working in the first place.

She leaned back with a resigned sigh as she promised herself she would try calling him during dinner time and pray he wouldn't be working. Suddenly her phone went off, and with a start, she looked at the display, and a slight sliver of hope took root when she saw it was an unknown number.

Taking a deep breath, she accepted the call. "Sarah Felidae."

"Sarah? It's Harris Umbra. We met a couple of days ago when I hung on your grandma's car door to ask if you needed help?" Sarah had to smile at the questioning way that statement was made. Like she could have forgotten the hare after their somewhat unusual hookup.

Smiling happily she thought about what to say. "Of course I remember you, Harris. How have you been? I believe I saw you on the news yesterday and then they reported an officer getting hurt, so I was kinda worried that something had happened to you." Hoping that the statement and questions had been neutral enough not to cause unease she waited for his answer.

"Don't worry I'm alright, but the officer that got hurt is a direct colleague of mine." The statement came over a bit tersely, and the lioness decided to not dig deeper into it. Harris was okay, and that was the main point.

"I'm sorry to hear that Harris really." The lioness tried to be as genuine as she could but wondered and feared if the feelings behind her statement would be well received over the telephone.

"Thanks, Sarah, but that was not why I was calling you."

The lioness felt a pit open up in her stomach. The fears that the hare would think about the whole dating a lion thing and decide that dating a bigger mammal was not something Harris was happy to do seemed to be coming through. Resigning herself to be dumped before she even had a first date she spoke up. "Oh? What can I help you with then?" She tried to keep a jovial tone in her voice, but even she could hear it was a bit strained.

"It's about the date this Saturday." Okay, here it came. Shutting her eyes and steeling herself for the rejection she squeezed the phone a bit tighter. "The chief has me working this weekend, and it probably includes the evenings, so I was wondering if you were okay with moving our date to next Wednesday?" Her eyes flew open as the fear shattered and the giddy feeling following filled her up.

"That's fine by me. Will you still pick me up at five or do you want to meet up somewhere?"

"No I'll pick you up at five, but I haven't decided about what to do for our first date. Do you have any wishes?" Sarah thought about that question only for a couple of seconds. It was their first date and were just seeing if they liked hanging out together, so this time didn't need to be a big deal yet.

"How about just going out for fast food with a movie afterward?" There, that should be casual and safe enough.

"Seems like a plan I'll be picking you up at five then."

Afterwards, the lioness and hare said their goodbyes, and as Sarah hung up the phone, she noticed the happy look her grandma was giving her. "See how much better it is to know that he is safe?"

The lioness sighed. "Yes Nana, you were right." As Sarah sat down again, the news had switched seeing as new information had been acquired about the ambulance crash, and as the story unfolded about it, it showed the pictures of the three mammals injured.

* * *

Across town, a very pink mammal got the scare of his life and ran towards his cell phone all the while being regarded by the confused stares of his employers.

* * *

Judy sat back and let out a weary sigh. She had just ended the call to the academy to ask major Friedkin if it was possible to have some time on the training course and if she could see the file on Fragrance to see how far his training had gone and what his results were so the rabbit could plan out her training regiment accordingly.

What she got, however, was that Bogo had already called them and just like him she was told that there was no record existing for the skunk. Ursula was looking into the matter as the chief had informed her what had apparently taken place during her absence and if there were something the polar bear would not stand for then it was possible corruption seeping into her academy.

For now, it was all unofficial, but with the way, things were progressing it was clear that chief Bogo and major Friedkin were about to unleash a full-blown investigation into the matter. Judy prayed that the inquiry would not start until after the demonstration as this sounded like something she would like to be a part of.

As the door to her office opened, she looked up and saw Harris enter. "Any luck getting us time on the course?"

"Yep, we have been cleared to use the course in the afternoons when the current trainees have their lessons." The rabbit was a bit let down about that. The evenings would leave them with short training times on the course. Maybe she could rope Nick, Ralph, and Nadine into training with them. Not only could they get a feel for how the skunk moved and thought, but the skunk could get a feel for the opposing force he would be up against in the demonstration as well. "Got everything squared with the homefront?"

Harris nodded his head as he sat down in the chair opposite Hopps. Seeing is it was Wilde's it was a size too large for him. "Yeah, I've informed my family I won't be home this weekend." It was technically no lie as he had called his mom after finishing talking to Sarah to tell her too that he would be busy with work this weekend. As he thought back on the conversation, he had with Sarah he had to frown. She had sounded off during their call. It wasn't till he had asked her if they could move the date to Wednesday that she seemed to loosen up.

The hare was a lot of things, but he wasn't stupid, and something told him that if he wanted more than one date with the lovely lioness, he would need to step up his game. Now it was decided that it would be fast food and a movie however it limited his options, but making sure to have flowers for his date when he picked her up would not go amiss.

The sound of a desk chair moving pulled Umbra out of his ramifications and as he watched Hopps heading out, she looked over her shoulder. "Get a move on Harris we have a lot of work ahead of us and not nearly enough time to do it in."

Judy left her office and headed for the locker rooms. Her first stop would be her fox boyfriend. Not only did they need to partner up before the skunk could hope for a chance to be prepared enough for Wednesday. They also needed to meet with Bogo to make sure that when the investigation started that they were also part of it.

* * *

Soniko was fighting for her life. She didn't know what had gotten into the dad or how he had gotten hold of her shockgun, but the blow to the head of the paramedic trying to intervene had been hard enough that she believed she heard his skull crack. Now she was trying to disarm the mad mammal all the while doing her best to keep it pointed away from the other occupants of the vehicle. Sadly the quick move the assailant pulled when he let go of the shockgun with one hand and rammed his elbow into her face left her groggy and unable to restrain him.

The ambulance driver turned around asking what was going on and at that moment the dad fired a shockbolt hitting him in the head. Cindy saw the ambulance turn sharply heading for the concrete wall. The baby on the stretcher gave her only one option, and she grabbed the little one and folding herself around it praying that she would be enough to keep it safe.

A lot happened during the crash, and Cindy only remembered snippets of it. One of them was the pain from slamming into the divider all the while holding on to the little one for dear life. Then she was lying on the floor of the ambulance while the baby was crying in her arms. The red panda was happy that the little one seemed to be fine, but those feelings were short-lived as the bundle was taken from her and a foot was put on her chest, pushing her to the ground.

Struggling to breathe she looked up at the eyes of the father. It was said that the eyes were the window to the soul and it had to be said Cindy could indeed see the heart of this mammal and it was totally utterly insane. "Thank you for saving my baby, officer." The mocking laugh the mammal gave made it abundantly clear that this child was not his and Soniko realized exactly who she was dealing with.

"You won't get away with this!" The red panda hissed the words at her assailant. She wouldn't bow down or cower for him.

"Oh, sweetheart I already did." At this, the 'dad' put the shockgun to her chest and pulled the trigger. Pain flooded through Cindy and as she screamed the assailant laughed. "Oops! Forgot to change the settings. Silly me." Cindy looked through her tears and saw the maniac modify the configuration to the lethal setting. "Now my dear it has been fun, but this one is for keeps."

Cindy closed her eyes not wanting to have the face of the criminal be the last thing on her mind. Even though she tried to think of her family another face popped up and her eyes flew open again. 'Joe...'

Why did she have to remember him at this time? Sadness filled Cindy as the feelings of anger she had against him seemed so stupid now. His face also gave her the will to try to fight back as she wanted to talk to him and clear things up. She had opened her eyes just in time to see the gun back on her chest again, and as she tried to move to save herself she saw the killer wave goodbye as he pulled the trigger...

With a scream, she sat straight up in the hospital bed. Gasping for breath, she looked around in bewilderment. A nightmare. A horrible nightmare. Feeling her face, she felt the wetness of her tears. She got a start when a paw was put on her shoulder, and as she looked who was there, she noticed the kind look of the old hyena nurse.

"Bad dreams dear?" The nurse had seen that the panda had a nightmare, but just as she was about to wake her, she had woken up. "Here drink this it will make you feel better." She handed Cindy a glass of water that was on her nightstand.

Soniko noticed how her paws shook as she brought the glass to her mouth. The red panda took small sips as she tried to calm down a bit. Emptying the glass, she handed it back to the elderly nurse. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it it's what we're here for. You okay now or do you need some more water?" The hyena looked at her a bit worriedly as the panda seemed quite shaken.

Letting out a shaky sigh Cindy tried again to get herself back under control. "I'm fine, but could you give me another glass of water in case I get thirsty later?"

"Sure hon." The hyena departed, and Cindy looked around. It was just after midday and her mother would be picking her up shortly. The red panda had opted to try to get some sleep like the doctor ordered, but now that seemed like it had been the wrong thing to do.

As she laid back, she put her arm over her face. At the moment the killer had made it abundantly clear he was going to finish her off she had resigned to her fate. Yet Joe's face had popped up, and suddenly she didn't want to die. Didn't want to leave things like they were. Wanted to clear the air between them and have the friendship restored that they had when they were kids.

The door to the ward opened again, and the kind nurse, as well as her mother, walked in. "Hi, honey. Did you have a nightmare?"

Cindy cursed the sweet nurse in her head. Off course she would inform her mother. "Yeah, mom. Just a nightmare. I'm fine now."

"Okay honey if you're sure" Leslie wasn't so sure her daughter was okay, and she was also not confident that her decision after the phone call from Joe was the right one. If she were wrong, her daughter would be the one hurt. Settling her nerves, she looked Cindy in the eye. "Someone was calling for you at the house. The news picked up that you were in the hospital and he called right after."

Soniko's heart rate picked up as she hoped it had been the one mammal she needed to patch things up with. "Was it Joe?"

Leslie looked at the hall and as Cindy followed her gaze saw the skunk she needed. As tears started falling, Cindy gave a small whimper and stretched her arms out to him suddenly filled with the overwhelming need to hold him. The skunk was by her side in just a few strides, and as the two friends grabbed each other for dear life, the bonds that had been shattered so long ago started to mend again.

"The news reported you were seriously hurt in the crash." Joe couldn't say more. It said it all. The red panda squeezed him a bit tighter. "I couldn't reach anyone at the ZPD that could tell me more. Thankfully mom kept her cool and found your families address and phone number on the internet." The skunk took a deep breath as he shivered miserably. All the way to the hospital he had thought about how he would find her and even though her mom had tried to assure him she was okay it hadn't clicked till he saw her sitting up in her hospital bed.

The red panda was still shedding tears, but she was sure these were of the happy variant. "When all that was going down I realized I was about to die and when I tried to think the only thing that came up was your face. And suddenly I was so sad because now I couldn't mend things between us and the last thing you'd remember that I was angry with you and that we we.. weren't friends anymore." Her voice breaking the red panda sniffled as Joe softly caressed her back soothingly.

"Whatever happened to make you so mad at me I'm sure it was my fault." Joe didn't give a damn anymore what had happened or who was the blame. It probably had been him, and he'd been too stupid to realize what he had done. Whatever it was he'd apologize properly for being so stupid and fix things.

Cindy shook her head. "It's not important. We lost enough time already without having to deal with what happened in the past. So please let's say that you forgive me and I forgive you, and we are friends again."

The skunk tightened his hold on her a bit more. "Deal. Friends. Best friends even." Cindy nodded, and with that small but significant event of forgiveness, everything was right with the world again for them.

Cindy opened her eyes and saw her mom smile happily at her. As the red panda returned the smile, she turned her attention to the skunk in her arms again and suppressed a chuckle. "So Joe. Care to explain why you're that garish color pink?"


	16. Chapter 15 - Time constraints and past a

**Authors note:**

 **I'm back! Workload has lessened and I'm back to my writing. The rewrites of the earlier chapters are still going on so you'll notice that if you reread that there is more flavour. I had to add one scene to the story this is because the forgiveness scene last chapter made not much impact in my opinion. While I'm adding to the chapters I'm rewriting their feelings a bit so the anger at each other is better felt by the readers. Well for now please enjoy.**

* * *

 **Chapter 15: Time constraints and past annoyances.**

The atmosphere in the chiefs room was oppressive as the mammals currently in the debate where all unwilling to back down. The chief had told Hopps and consorts that the investigation into the academy was ready to commence and couldn't delay much longer. The current selection of students was nearing their first trimester, and they needed to confirm that they were not subjected to any corruption that seemed to have slithered into the academy.

Judy, on the other hand, had pointed out that delaying for just a couple more weeks would allow her and Nick to be included in the investigation. Not only that, but they could go undercover under the auspice that they had accepted the offer to help train the recruits as guest instructors for the semester. That way they would have the means to aid in searching the academy without anyone working there (apart from the mayor) catching on to the investigation.

This had led to a stalemate both sides were unsure on how to resolve. The urgent need for action could not be denied nor could the advantage of undercover agents with a totally free reign of the academy.

As Bogo pondered what would be the best options Harris decided to speak up. "Sir. Can I point out another advantage of having Hopps and Wilde infiltrate instead of someone else?" The buffalo turned his attention to his newest member and nodded.

"Just as Hopps has stated it would be ideal for them to go undercover as there is interest already to have them teach but don't forget the added bonus of Soniko's injury," Harris started babbling to try to get his point across. He had noticed that the chief's face was currently looking rather confused and he knew that if he didn't do anything to clear things up that he ran the risk of him being thrown out of the office for complicating matters. "What I mean by that is that you pointed out that Soniko is not cleared for duty until you see fit. Now if we change the story a little we can have Soniko accompanying them under the guise that she is there for rehabilitation purposes and being overseen by the officers that she was assigned too."

The chief sat back and thought about what the hare was saying. "And how will the addition of a hurt officer be beneficial to the investigation officer Umbra?" Bogo wasn't thrilled at the prospect of assigning a hurt member of his squad to an investigation even if she consented to be part of it.

"First of she, like me has knowledge of events as they happened that year and can supply Hopps and Wilde with additional information as well as inform them of anything that has changed. If there was a setup to get drugs into the academy than it's removal will have left clues as well as voids. While the undercover agents will probably find the clues, the voids might be overlooked. By having Soniko look for anything missing the change to find more evidence will increase. Secondly, by assigning Soniko, we get access to the expelled student Joe Fragrance and his point of view about events at the academy."

Bogo sighed and looked over at Judy and Nick. "While I believe Umbra to be partly correct about Soniko's inclusion and benefit to the investigation the part about the chance of getting access to Fragrance's insights are sadly rather diminished at this moment."

Harris looked confused and thought back to see if he could have missed something. Just as he wanted to ask for clarification, Nick spoke up. "While patrolling with Soniko on our first day, we passed an old friend of mine with his new hire, and as we passed, we noticed that Cindy's demeanor changed. Afterwards, I spoke with my friend and found out that his new hire was a recruit from the academy. You can guess who that was. He also told me that the two of them are currently in a fight so the chances are that he may reject our offer even if asked by Soniko."

The hare had to swallow the curse that was building. "Is this connected to Cindy not standing up for him during his expulsion?"

Nick shrugged. "You know more about the circumstances than we do at the moment. Let's just say that she's rather angry with him and if my friend is to be believed it seems more than mutual from his end."

The chief spoke up after clearing his throat. "Let's just see what happens during the demonstration. There is a chance of building trust with him during the training I've assigned you too. And yes Hopps that means that I include you into the official investigation. However I can't delay any longer, but luckily thanks to Umbra's suggestion we won't have to. Seeing as you will be training Joe for the event, there is a window in which all of you including Fangmeyer and Wolford can infiltrate under cover of training."

Judy nodded with a smile. The worry about not being part of this was finally lifted, but there was just one detail that had come up she needed clarification on. "Do we inform Fragrance on our intent or are we leaving him in the dark on our investigation while we train him?"

Bogo thought for a moment. "See how things progress. If the anger between him and Soniko is too much to work through keep him in the dark. Otherwise, we run the risk he might choose to hinder us while we look around. On the same note if things seem like their problems can be patched up without too much hassle trying to get his cooperation. Officers, we are sure there was a crime committed, and if we are able to get the cooperation of Soniko and Fragrance, we might have three reliable witnesses in Harris and them to guide us through the events that happened. Make use of them and find out where the drugs came from and who was supposed to use them."

"Who is our primary contact while on site?" Nick asked while looking at the happy state of his girlfriend. The fox knew how much this investigation meant and how much she had wanted to be a part of it.

"Mayor Friedkin is your primary contact to report too. She will also oversee that all evidence that you bring to her is transported here as we no longer can trust members of the academy's staff. This seeing as the drugs found seems to have vanished in thin smoke ever since."

The hare looked up shocked. "Wait the drugs found in Joe's locker have disappeared? Why didn't the detectives charged with the investigation report that?"

Bogo looked irritated at that. "Because officer Umbra there never was an investigation." Looking at the appalled face of the hare the chief let out a sigh. "Believe me when I say that you're not the only one who wonders what happened, but it seems the drugs never got reported after Fragrance was expelled. How they got away with not reporting or even why they wouldn't want to report it is also part of the investigation. That's also why we can't wait any longer with the investigation as we also have to worry what's happening with the missing drugs."

The chief stood up and watched as his officers straightened out awaiting assignment. "Before I hand you your assignments I would be remiss to not remind you about your offer of assistance to the Bunnyburrow PD. They have accepted and expect to see you in one month time. That means that you will only have four weeks to get to the bottom of this before you get switched out and taken off the case."

Judy cursed herself mentally for forgetting their suggestion to the chief to help out their colleagues of the BPD and the visit to her parents. "Understood chief we'll have to make sure to have this thing wrapped up before the festival."

The buffalo nodded to his officers and gave them their assignment. "Your current tasks are as followed. One. Meet up and try to recruit officer Soniko into this investigation. She is set to be discharged from the hospital and might probably already be on her way home. Inform her about the details of the investigation and see if she's interested in joining. After that meetup and try to gain the assistance of Fragrance. Two. Head to the academy and meet up with Mayor Friedkin. She'll inform you on your tasks for the week of training as well of your 'official' tasks after the demonstration is completed. Furthermore, she'll provide you with areas and persons of interest to your investigation. You will keep her and me informed of all your findings during your time there. Three. After three weeks expect a call from the BPD with the details of your posting during the festival. If you haven't found any substantial leads by then start compiling all the evidence you found for your replacements so the investigation can go on seamlessly after you have left for Bunnyburrow. Now there is a lot to do, and you have your orders. Dismissed."

The three small mammals saluted and left the office. Judy and Nick checked with Clawhauser if Cindy had left the hospital already and learning she hadn't been released yet decided to head on over there. Harris chose to inform Nadine and Ralph of their current assignment and then head over to his apartment to pack for the week ahead.

* * *

Joe and Cindy were relaxing while they waited for the surgeon or nurse that would release the red panda from the hospital so her mom could take her home. Lylith had offered to see if she could find the doctor responsible for Cindy's care. Not only to speed up her daughter's release but also to give her and her friend some time alone so they could get reacquainted with each other.

The panda was sitting in her bed while the skunk sat at her side. As they talked things over with them, Joe had taken her hand, and as they softly let their fingers intertwine, they smiled at each other.

Just as Cindy was about to speak up, her mother came back in. The friends looked at Lilly and noticed that the panda had a worried look on her face. "Cindy there's someone from the force here to speak to you." As the young panda wondered which of her colleagues would need to see her the door opened again.

The smile that greeted them was enough to make the panda sick. By the feeling of Joe's hand tightening around hers, she knew that he wasn't fairing any better. She quickly glanced to her side to see his face and saw the narrowing of his eyes and the snarl adjourning his features it was clear he was pissed.

Turning back to her visitor she mentally steadied herself and gave her friend's hand a soft squeeze to try to calm him down. "Sergeant Jenner I must admit that I never thought to see you again this soon after graduating." Their old instructor from the academy nodded to Lilly who also understood by her daughter's demeanor that this visitor was not there for a friendly visit. "Now might I ask what I have to thank for your visit?"

The moose smirked at the pair. "I've been assigned to the investigation of the ambulance crash." At that statement, both mammals on the bed gave each other a sidelong glance. That investigation had been closed as far as they knew seeing that the crash had been caused by the murderer and therefore the collision was part of the overall investigation of the murder at the apartments and the assault on the officers there.

Just as Cindy wanted to speak up to tell the sergeant as such, he held up his paw to silence her. "Don't bother! It was the only way I was able to get myself in this case. I'm sure you both are part of this, and I'm gonna find the evidence to prove it. First, you both used drugs to pass the exams and get into the ZPD and now you managed to infiltrate you wasted no time to get your comrades out of trouble."

The skunk and red panda looked at the moose with their mouths wide open. The amount of arrogance and ignorance on display was too much for both mammals to comprehend. Not only the pair had trouble dealing with this bit of info, but Cindy's mom was dumbstruck. She had realized that the officer was far from friendly, but to accuse her daughter of aiding and embedding while she had been shot had been a mental slap to the face.

As she tried to rally her mental capacities to form a reply to these allegations the skunk spoke up. "You are not really suggesting that Cindy was helping that maniac are you? For heaven's sake, she was the one that got shot or did you forget that fact?"

The moose chuckled. "Yeah, she did get shot, didn't she? And the gun was even on the lethal setting, how lucky for her then is it that the gun malfunctions at that moment." His face hardened. "Cut the bullpoop. She and her friend made sure to disable the ambulance personnel and then proceeded to damage the gun to make sure she had an alibi. And if that fact is too hard to prove I can assure you 'Pinky' that her connection to you is al the proof I need."

The skunk stood up and wanted to grab the moose and give him a good shake to see if he could loosen some sense in the sergeant. But as he tried to move he felt his wrist being restrained. Looking down he saw Cindy holding his wrist in a firm grip while eyes of steel looked at him. Her eyes said it all 'don't get involved let me handle it.' Joe took a deep breath and leaned back against the mattress.

"Good boy seems she is breaking you in nicely." The nasty leer on the moose's face was back in full force and made the skunk rather ill. "Now seeing as there is a BOLO out for the arrest of a pink mammal responsible for the trouble at the apartments I don't think you should make this more difficult than this has to be." At this, the moose pulled out his handcuffs and his shockgun and threw the handcuffs at the skunk. "Now if you would be so kind as to cuff yourself behind you back we can get going. I've got a lot of questions, and you'd do well to make sure you have answers."

At this Cindy intervened. "You can't be serious! I was there when Hopps put out the BOLO, and it's only to question him because he might have information on the case. There is nothing about an arrest."

The moose rolled his eyes at her. "Right another small mammal that thinks she knows policing. Believe me, if she was really such an excellent police officer if everyone claims she would have seen through your act and arrested you both. But what can you expect when that airhead can't even see that what for a swindler her partner is, but then what can you expect from a bunny who's only been put on this planed to do one thing and a criminal fox.

"Well I can't talk for you Carrots, but I'm somewhat offended."

As the moose turned to the new arrivals, everyone took notice who had entered.

Judy had a look of silent rage with her ears all the way back, and Nick had a small smile on his face, but Cindy took notice that his features had hardened significantly. Her mom took the chance to speak up. "Thank god you arrived officers! This colleague of yours just started accusing my daughter and tried to arrest her friend."

The bunny's eyes narrowed a little more. "Seeing as this is a hospital I'm gonna stay calm and ignore the smears against my partner and me, as well as pretend that you were not about to arrest a witness for no reason. But make no mistake I'll make sure your supervisor is informed about your actions here."

The moose shrugged his shoulders. "Go ahead. Make a stink if that's what you want, but as long as you don't realize who your friends are you are nothing but a burden to the force."

Judy snorted. "And who would my friends be then? I guess you?"

Jenner laughed. "Fat chance! Cute bunnies like you will never have any real friends on the force, and the sooner you realize that, the sooner you and your fluffy tail can get back to where you came from and start doing what cute bunnies do best."

At that, Nick let out a low growl. "My partner was nice enough to give you an opportunity to leave. I suggest you take it."

"Don't worry I know when I'm outnumbered, but don't worry I'll make sure to get you small riff-raff out of the ZPD and bring it back to the greatness it was before it let all you rabble in." With that, the moose walked between them and left the room, but not before pushing the fox roughly to the side. At that Judy spun around and it would have gone pretty bad for the moose if Nick didn't intervene.

"No Carrots! Don't play into his game. This is exactly what he's trying you to act like." The fox held her back as she shivered with anger and rage. Nick looked at the bed and saw that Cindy had grabbed the pink skunk that was standing there as he too seemed ready to start a fight with the scumbag of a moose. As he looked carefully, he noticed that the skunk was actually the red panda's friend and Nick wondered what had happened to them the last couple of days for them to be so close at this moment.

Judy was calming down although her breathing was still elevated from the adrenaline her rage had given her. "Thank you, officers I'm glad you came when you did." The bunny turned around as Cindy's mom approached them.

"No problem ma'am I'm sorry that you were exposed to this kind of behavior. Make no mistake we'll make sure disciplinary action will be taken."

Joe spoke up while sitting back down. "He's a colleague of you?"

Nick just declined as he shook his head. "No way! He's from a different district. But I guess that the crash was in their jurisdiction. However the investigation is currently being done by detectives from precinct one, so he doesn't have any legal right to accuse or arrest anyone linked to this case."

The red panda on the bed let out a sigh. "Good to know, but I'm sure he's gonna be a problem anyway."

The bunny walked over to the bed and gave the pair of friends an unamused glance. "We'll deal with it if it comes to that, but for now we have things to discuss, and I'll have some questions for you too, sir. I trust you will help us in our investigation."

Joe sat up a bit straighter and nodded his consent. Judy gave him a short nod back and then took a double take as she looked him over again. "This might be a strange question, but aren't you Fragrance?"

Cindy snorted, and Joe closed his eyes giving a weary sigh. Judy and Nick exchanged a glance and realized that getting Fragrances cooperation had become a lot easier for them.


	17. Chapter 16 - Leads and laughter

**Chapter 16: Leads and laughter**

Judy and Nick took stock of the situation shortly after kicking the police sergeant out of the room. The partners noticed that the red pandas and the skunk were quite perturbed by what just had happened.

Judy surprised by the seemingly friendly atmosphere surrounding the red panda and skunk decided not to brief Cindy on the oncoming investigation and not to request her cooperation till she had time to determine how much the relationship between them had improved and how much he would be inclined to help out the zpd in general.

Remembering the fur the investigators had found on the cage that had been used to transport the chickens to the alley the bunny opted to question the skunk first about his possible involvement in what happened. Deciding to start with the obvious she went on to ask Joe about what happened to his fur and determining that his fur color changing did indeed occur before the birds were transporter she wondered if he had transported chickens across the city at any point in time in the last couple of days.

Not really getting the importance of the fowl he had delivered with his colleague the skunk informed the rabbit about his job with FDS and that they indeed had delivered them to the markets, but couldn't tell her correctly which market owners precisely had received shipments. This because he had been a bit mentally unstable at that moment. However, he remembered that all deliveries had been signed and filed so if she asked his employer he should be able to supply her with that information.

Nick seeing that Judy had the pair on the bed covered decided to speak with Lilly in an attempt to calm her down. The fox noticed through the red panda's body language that her ire was slowly rising. This as the bizarre treatment her daughter had received just a few minutes before was slowly sinking in. In an attempt to keep her calm Nick got her statement on the officer's behavior before they had arrived and had to shake his head at the apparent lack of respect the three mammals had been subjected too. Therefore it came to no surprise that the red panda exclaimed when the statement was finished that she wanted to press a formal complaint on the moose as he had apparently gone way overboard on his accusations. It took Nick a lot of effort just to keep Lilly from losing it and on point so he could make sure that the red panda knew precisely where she needed to go to make her complaint and what paperwork would be required. He did this so when she put forth her accusation it would be without errors. This would mean the administration had all the facts they needed to conduct a proper investigation and wouldn't be stuck correcting faults in the paperwork wasting precious time.

The two officers were comfortable that they had gotten all the info they needed from the friends on the bed and the mother decided to start talking about the demonstration and what they needed from the skunk before it happened. "So mister Fragrance what have you been told in the demonstration you are supposed to take part in a couple of days on Wednesday?"

Joe shrugged his shoulders trying to ignore the confused look his friend was giving him. "Nothing more than that I would be part of a firefight simulation where I squared against three armed zpd officers."

This was the first time the red panda heard about this, and she was wondering why her friend was drafted for this exercise. "Sorry, but I've seemed to miss a part of the plot here. What demonstration are we talking about and why is Joe part of it?" Cindy's face spoke volumes about how confused she was, and as the skunk looked at her, he couldn't suppress the need to joke around a bit.

"Let me educate you oh blue-eyed one. FDS the company that I work for has surprisingly got a research division and the badger that is the head of it has been contracted to developed new protective clothing and uniforms for the ZPD. The way they have told me it seems that if the test coming Wednesday is a success the clothes will become the standard gear for officers like you in the future. Hopefully, when the time comes to test them I hope they don't confuse the gender of the uniform they need to supply me with as it would mean I would have to deal with nasty chafing in the private area."

The red panda groaned at the apparent lack of a funny bone her friend clearly didn't possess. Pushing through her mock irritation, she decided to question Joe further as this was the first time she heard anything about this. "So these new uniforms are gonna be shown off during the exercise? But why is it just you against three fully armed and trained officers? It seems a bit on the unfair side if you look at it."

The skunk smiled at his friend and leaned back taking a more comfortable position. "I know, but apparently the chief of police wouldn't allow more than three of his officers to be used during the exercise and I was not allowed to take a handicap. It is a crying shame, but I just have to take extra care not to hurt them too much." While the skunk didn't feel as confident as he was pretending to be it felt good to joke around with his friend again.

Nick had to chuckle a bit at the cheek of the skunk. "Ooh, I'll have to tell Ralph and Nadine what you just said. Although I doubt that we'll be extra careful when we engage you." The fox tapped his muzzle with a finger like he was deep in thought. "Well even if we are outclassed it is good to know that you'll go easy on us so it seems we can go all out." The mocking tone the fox used had gotten the skunks attention, and his eyes widened in shock as he realized who he would be stuck engaging that Wednesday.

Judy chuckled at the fearful stare the skunk was giving them and turned her attention to her boyfriend with a smirk on her face. "Normally I'd agree with you Slick, but I'll bet you twenty that he'll beat your collective tails after I'm done with training him."

Nick turned his attention to his girlfriend before giving her a mocking smile. "Oh, you're on fluff. Going to the old watering hole will be all the sweeter if I'm paying my drinks with your money." The fox gave the bunny a toothy grin and ruffled her ears.

The bunny brought her attention back towards the skunk. "You heard my partner, so you better make sure you win, or I'll be making sure that you'll be on the receiving end of some advanced hand to hand exercises afterward."

The skunk had to suppress a shudder while he looked at Judy because the hard look she gave him made her look more like a big predator than a small bunny. "Before I'm gonna commit to anything how do you mean you'll be training me?"

"Just what it sounds like. The chief made me responsible for making sure you're ready coming Wednesday to impress the investors and mayor." Judy gave the skunk a skeptical look and while she could clearly see that the skunk had at least kept up with the training regiment needed to keep fit, but even a cursory comparison with her fox clearly showed that Nick outclassed Joe regarding fitness. It was also worse if she considered the other two officers. Joe and Nick were in the same size class so Nick might let his guard down, and if the skunk played it smart, he might (and that was a colossal might mind you) get one over on her fox. However, with someone like Fangmeyer or Wolford who both had more significant body mass presenting more surface area as a target for the skunk to aim at, but who also possesed years and years worth of experience on the force. There was no doubt in her mind that they would make short work of him.

No this would not do, and Judy realized that the time frame offered was barely enough for her to get a feel for his skills let alone train him. The bunny sighed heavily. "Darnit! Nick, can you stay and escort them? I'm not so sure our good old 'buddy' isn't going to try to accost them on their way going home."

The fox look confused as he watched his bunny turn and leave the hospital room. "Uh. Sure Carrots, but where are your going?"

Judy turned back to Nick as she was about to slip through the door. "I'm going to talk to Chief Bogo about delaying the demonstration for another couple of days." She pointed to Joe as she continued. "He's nowhere where he needs to be to stand a chance against you three. Even if I could start training him right this second, it would barely be enough."

At her words, the fox had to stop the bunny from continuing without discussing it first. "Wait a minute Carrots I'm pretty sure the bet didn't say anything about you adding more time for his training. So I'm pretty sure this could be considered cheating you know?" The fox looked a bit peeved at his girlfriend.

Judy chuckled and gave the fox a knowing look. Even though cheating had not been on her mind, she had to admit he was right in the fact that it increased her chances of winning their bet. She leaned on the doorframe and gave the fox a mocking stare. "It's called a hustle sweetheart."

Nick was about to respond with a snarky comeback before he was cut off. "Wait you're going to the police station?"

The two officers turned their attention towards Lilly. Judy needed a second to switch gears but remembering the abuse the red panda had been subjected to spoke as politely as possible while she fell back on her professional police attitude. "Yes, ma'am. Can I assist you with anything?"

"Yes, I'd like to accompany you so I can make the formal complaint now." Remembering that her daughter still needed transportation the red panda turned towards the bunny's partner. "You're going to drive my daughter and her friend home right?"

Nick made sure to mirror Judy's respectfulness as he too didn't want to cause any more stress for the red panda. "Don't worry ma'am I'll personally make sure they get home safe."

Lilly nodded and made to leave as she spoke to her daughter. "Make sure to listen to your colleague till your home. Don't be surprised, by the way, your father took a couple of days off so he could be with you when you came home." Then she turned to Joe. "You're welcome to stay with us for dinner if you want to. It wouldn't be any trouble to add an extra plate this evening."

The skunk had to think the offer over. Joe had panicked the morning when he learned that Cindy had gotten hurt and left rather abruptly, in the process abandoning Finnick and Honey as they all were about to go to the police station themselves to meet the chief. He felt a chill run through his spine. The meeting! With the head of the zpd! The meeting was about the demonstration and what was expected from him. "I'm sorry missus Soniko, but I was supposed to go to the zpd myself as there was a meeting scheduled today between my employer and the chief about the demonstration we just spoke of."

Judy was about to respond that the skunk could ride with them when she noticed Cindy's expression. The happy smile she had when her mother had invited Joe for dinner quickly was replaced with a very disappointed look before she recovered and put up a brave front that looked so sad that it almost broke the bunnies heart. "Don't worry about the meeting mister Fragrance. Seeing as I have been assigned to oversee your training, I'll make sure to brief you when I come collect my fox after I have had my talk with the chief."

Then it happened. Not only did Judy see the happy smile return to her red panda colleague, but there also was the relieved face and smile of the skunk too. The bunny was now pretty sure that whatever had troubled the two friends in the past, it seemed to at least have been resolved so far that they were friends again. How close their friendship was, however, was still up in the air.

She turned her attention to Lilly who was also looking intently at the interaction between her daughter and her friend while she too seemed to try to figure their relationship out. "Miss do you have a car here or did you plan for someone to pick you up?"

The red skunk turned her attention back to the officer. "I've got my car in the hospital's parking garage why?"

"Do you mind driving? This way my partner can take the cruiser." As Lilly nodded her consent, Judy fished the keys out of her pocket and tossed them at her foxy partner. "Here Slick make sure to take care of my baby alright?"

"Your baby? Really Carrots?" Nick had to shake his head. Of course, their cruiser had been custom fit for them to operate safely, but he had never heard her talk so fondly about it before.

As the red panda and bunny left the room, she gave him a friendly wave. Nick just chuckled at her antics and shook his head before he turned his attention back to the pair on the bed. "So you ready to go home?"

"Well we are, but we are still waiting for someone of the medical staff to clear her for release." The skunk sat back and let out a sigh. The last couple of hours had been a rather intense roller coaster of emotions, and he was looking forward to just sit back and relax for a couple of moments, but that was only after he had made sure that Cindy was brought back to her home and safe.

Just as Nick was about to offer to see if he could scrounge up someone to do that the door opened and Cindy's doctor entered.

* * *

Sargeant Jenner in the meanwhile was fuming in his cruiser. Damn those stupid pieces of wasted space. The hero's of Zootopia his ass. If they hadn't gone and butted in, when he was about to arrest that criminal, the moose was sure he would have had everything he needed to wrap this case up with a pretty pink bow.

The mule was not stupid by any count, and he too had noticed that something was wrong in the academy, although he hadn't been one hundred percent sure what it was. It began with Major Friedkin suddenly needing to do all kinds of unexpected training regiments that had been unrequired before. This forced the academy to call in experienced zpd officers to take over the practice of the recruits. Then he found out she was required to do so much of them to the extent that she would never be able to do them in time to be back in a timely fashion and therefore had to be absent for the whole duration of one training roster.

So when Jenner started training the class, he looked for anything out of place, and he soon noticed the two mammals who were performing way above anything the moose had seen before or considered feasible for the two small mammals. It had not been a massive leap for the moose to suspect that body enhancing drugs had been involved and he had even prepared steps to have everyone tested again just a couple of months before graduation. But just as he was about to perform the tests Jenner was warned by one of the guards that they had let a suspicious person on campus grounds get away from them.

The sergeant already suspecting the pair of small mammals of drug abuse concluded that what the guards stumbled upon was probably a delivery and immediately ordered a search of every student's private belongings as well as their gym lockers and bedside storage trunks. It had come as no surprise to him when he found the drugs in the locker of the skunk. And the fact that the red panda pretended they weren't friends while their body language during training exercises had spoken volumes about the attraction they seemed to have towards each other synched it for him. Sadly when he ordered the drugs test be conducted the next day, it appeared too late already as the red panda seemed to have done something to remove the drugs from her system. It had irritated him to no end that he hadn't been able to kick her out as well.

Jenner hit his head against the steering wheel. ' _Stupid, stupid, stupid._ ' He should have paid more attention. After the failed tests he had put haste in pushing the paperwork to have the skunk suspended, and to his glee, this was done accordingly to his wishes, but the criminal investigation into the bastard that he had also ordered was never performed. The moose looked back at the hospital. ' _How did you do it, boy? How deep has the corruption sunk in that entire investigations can be shuffled under the carpet without anyone raising the alarm?_ ' The moose sighed. He knew that he too had been too hasty and didn't pay enough attention. So at the very least he was responsible in a big way as well.

After the class had graduated, he had been kind on edge wanting to know how far the investigation into the drugs had advanced. If they were lucky maybe they could expose the red panda for who she was before she could do any damage to the proud zpd name. However, when he returned to the academy, he learned that the drugs had ended up going missing and immediately looked into who was responsible for handling the investigation. The feelings of despair as he learned that no investigation ever had taken place had almost been overwhelming and had spurted him on to retrieve the paperwork and reports on the incident.

The mule's blood had run cold when he was told that they not only couldn't find the report on the incident, but the staff couldn't seem to be able to retrieve the skunk's whole file anymore as well. Whoever had removed the paperwork hadn't been a professional however as with a little hacking Jenner, later on, had been able to still find clues here and there of the skunk's attendance in the academy's system. But as far as the institute was concerned, there never had been a student with a stinky disposition there.

The sergeant growled again in frustration and casting a last hateful glare at the hospital started the cruiser. ' _Don't worry your criminal head, Stinky. I'm gonna make sure you will see the inside of a cozy jail cell if it's the last thing I do. And don't worry about your little girlfriend cause she'll have a nice cell of herself as well._ '

As he put the car into gear, the moose suddenly realized that he most likely would be getting some forced time off, courtesy of the complaint he was sure to follow his visit. Smiling at the irony that the mammals responsible for his coming unpaid holiday had unwittingly given him the time necessary to gather evidence on them. The first thing he needed to do after the punishment was handed down by his superior was getting his stuff together and go back to the scene of the crime to see what he could dig up at the academy.

* * *

Nick had taken his time getting the cruiser out of the parking garage to give the two friends time to get ready and was waiting for his colleague and her buddy at the entrance of the hospital. When the doctor arrived and had examined the panda to see if she was fit for release the fox had taken the opportunity to gauche how the two friends were acting around each other.

What hadn't surprised him was that while they were acting comfortable around each other, it seemed there was still kind of an edge there. Small touches and kind words were exchanged, but it all seemed kinda hesitant. Nick thanks to his time on the street had gotten quite good at seeing the tells mammals had, and as far as these two were concerned he could say without reservation that they were nervous for the reaction of the other and were testing the waters in every way they interacted.

As the doctor finished his examination and released the panda, he had explained to the red panda what she was and wasn't allowed to do. The skunk sitting close by had been paying particularly close attention. Nick was sure that until the red panda came home, her friend would be making sure that everything the doctor told her would be followed to the letter as well as make sure to inform her family back home as well of the instructions.

With the doctor's permission to leave in the pocket, Nick and the skunk had respectfully gone outside the room to provide the red panda an opportunity to get out of her pajama's in private and get ready to go home. The fox had decided to give the pair some privacy and get the cruiser. Walking towards the garage, he told Joe to meet him at the entrance as soon as Cindy was ready and now while he waited Nick wondered what was holding the two mammals up.

* * *

Joe in the meanwhile was leaning against the wall patiently waiting for his friend to get ready slowly getting bored when he heard her call his name from the room. As he entered, he feared he had been a bit too hasty as the red panda had dressed correctly, but was still lacking pants. The skunk looked at the face of his friend again and frowned as he noticed how terribly exhausted she looked. "What's wrong? Do I need to get the doctor again?"

The panda gave him a weak smile while she shook her head. "No, I just need help with getting my pant on as it seems I can't muster up the energy required to pull them up." She hated feeling this helpless, but silently hoped that her friend would be kind enough to call a nurse and not give her too much hassling for this.

Joe looked at the tired smile of his friend and noticed the jeans she spoke off in her hand. Later on, he realized that it would have been less embarrassing for them both if he had taken the time to understand what she wanted and gone to get a nurse to help her out, but he wasn't thinking clearly after everything that had happened that morning. "Okay, so I need to help you get your pants on, right?"

Cindy was confused by the different offer of help she received from her friend and accepted it without thinking herself. The morning had been somewhat strenuous for the young panda too. The skunk took the jeans from her and lifting one of her legs put it into one of the holes. It was the feeling of the muscles in her calves that suddenly chased the fog from his mind and suddenly he realized the situation he had put himself in. Joe tried as hard as he could not to think about the feeling of her leg or the softness of her fur and while he did his best to not have any lewd thoughts about his friend he worked to get the jeans on her as fast as he could.

The red panda also realized her that her acceptance of his offer had put her in a slightly awkward position and was doing her best not to show her embarrassment. She was silently thankful that her friend had been willing to do this for her even though it was clear that Joe had misunderstood what she had referred too. As he was pulling the jeans up her legs and was nearing her hips, the red panda somewhat too late realized, in total horror, what was about to happen.

When she had been accepted to the academy, her friends had thrown her a party and had pooled their resources to give her a couple of gifts. The weight set and work out clothes had been appreciated. However, there had also been a set of panties with each sporting a slightly funny suggestive text on the front of them. While they all had a good laugh about them, the red panda had made a promise to herself never to wear them. It had been a pair of those her mother had brought her, however, and Cindy couldn't really be bothered what she wore as long as she got to go home, so she had put them on without thinking about it.

As Joe put his hand behind her back and was about to raise his friend's hips to pull the jeans over them he noticed the panties she wore. They were white with cute pink hearts and while that wasn't so overwhelming to the poor skunk's sensibilities the text that adorned it was. **'If you can read this it's about to be your lucky day!'** The red blush, as he got the innuendo, flowing through the skunk making his fur look just a tad darker in color. He looked at his friend in total embarrassment trying desperately to think about anything that would make this situation less awkward.

Cindy just pushed her hands to her face and decided that the one thing that was good about this situation was that if she indeed did die from the embarrassment, it was at least reassuring that she was already at the hospital. Then she felt them. First, the giggles were small, but soon they grew in volume and frequency. And then looking at the confused and embarrassed face of Joe she couldn't hold it in anymore, and she fell back laughing her tail off.

Joe looked in wonder as Cindy had her arms on her stomach as she laughed wholeheartedly, but it wasn't until she snorted that he couldn't hold back his own chuckles anymore. He had to admit that most of the laughing they did was probably to dismiss the stress of the morning and to get rid of the strenuous atmosphere surrounding them, but as the friends continue laughing they couldn't seem to stop. Every time one of them seemed to get a handle on things Joe would notice the panties again, or Cindy would look at the skunks garish pink color and the friends would start all over again.

At the entrance of the room, Nick leaned against the doorpost and watched the two as they continued laughing with a smile on his face. After the pair had failed to materialized he had worried that the moose might have doubled back and had gone to see if they needed help. It had been quite a relief to find the two of them yakking it up, and as the fox looked on, he wondered how long they would need to calm down again.

* * *

Judy in the meantime was sitting in the passenger seat of the station car Lilly was driving towards precinct one. She was mulling over what she needed to say to Bogo to have him move the date down the week at least two or three days when the red panda cleared her throat. "Thank you, officer, for standing up for us back in the hospital. When that bastard started tearing into my daughter, I couldn't even speak up for her."

The bunny noticed the sad look Lilly had on her face and comfortingly put her paw on the red panda's arm. "You can't blame yourself for not being able to deal with something like that. I'm guessing you thought he was one of her colleagues from the precinct just there to talk to her right." She couldn't even imagine the shock of believing a friend had come to see her daughter only for that 'friend' to attack her.

The red panda nodded. "At first I believed the sergeant to be just that, but he was looking so serious that I feared that he was bringing bad news about the mammal that had hurt her, so I wanted him to talk to Cindy as soon as possible. But then she recognized him as her old instructor, and I can't remember him being at her graduation at all, so that confused me. Then he started to accuse her, and I just froze up."

What Lilly said was indeed what the bunny expected to hear. However what the panda just had said of her daughters graduation was something that was unexpected, and Judy had to frown at the implication of this snippet of information. "If he was her instructor he should have been present. Are you sure he wasn't there?"

Lilly nodded behind the wheel. "Positive. Mark and me where so proud of our little girl that we made sure to have a seat as close to the front as we could so my husband had a clear view of the stage without having to stand. It also helped having almost no animals in front of us when we taped her getting her badge."

The bunny turned her head. "You taped the graduation? Would you mind if my partner and I took a look at the tape when we get back to your house?"

"Sure I don't mind, but why? Do you think it has anything to do with what that moose was saying about what happened at the academy?" Lilly was sneaking peaks at the bunny as Judy was pondering what might be the reason the moose had been absent.

"I'm not sure ma'am, but for now I'm not willing to dismiss anything that might give me a lead into the events that happened back then."

"Then I will be adding three plates for dinner instead on one." And with that said, the red panda took the turn that let into the parking area of precinct one.


End file.
